《The Boy in the Bramble》


 Chapter 1. The Man at the Funeral

    The blackberry bramble had completely ensnared the backyard.


    The chain-link fence was lost beneath it. The gate to the parkland beyond was locked by thorny vines and hidden from view. It had engulfed three rose trellises, five spindly grown-from-the-pit avocado saplings, and a garden gnome. The sundial had been thoroughly throttled, and the boldest of the vines had progressed to making grasping forays onto the rusted old swing set.


    ¡°Wow,¡± said Cassie.


    ¡°That¡¯s what I said.¡± Matt took a pull from his beer and rolled his shoulders uncomfortably in his black suit jacket. It was too tight. He probably hadn¡¯t worn it since Tyler¡¯s wedding six years ago. ¡°Mom said she hadn¡¯t had time to do much gardening since Dad really started going downhill. I thought she meant, like, the parsley had gone to seed or whatever. But this is¡­ yeah.¡± He took another drink. ¡°This is intense.¡±


    The subdued clatter of the kitchen rose and fell as Tyler stepped outside. ¡°I brought you some casserole,¡± he said. ¡°Please help eat through the food or it¡¯s going to live in my freezer for the next decade.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve already had about three dozen deviled eggs,¡± Cassie replied, turning away from the blackberry behemoth. ¡°I don¡¯t think I can manage anything else.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ll hurt Mom¡¯s church friends¡¯ feelings.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sure they¡¯ll recover.¡±


    Matt snorted into his casserole. Tyler smiled thinly. ¡°What are you doing out here?¡±


    ¡°Hiding.¡± Cassie turned back to the blackberried yard. ¡°I don¡¯t know anybody here. Except you guys. And Mom.¡±


    ¡°Well, I¡¯m sure it would mean a lot to Mom if you were sociable. This is her community. With Dad gone, and the three of us out of the house, she¡¯s going to need these people in her life.¡± Cassie felt guilty enough to turn around and prepare to mingle until Tyler added, ¡°Plus I don¡¯t see either of you¡­ expanding the family any time soon.¡±


    ¡°Jesus, Tyler,¡± Matt muttered. He turned away and leaned on the deck railing.


    Cassie wordlessly slid open the door and marched through the kitchen, leaving a trail of mumbled condolences and awkward silences in her wake. Tyler was right about Mom, but frankly, he could shove the recommended sociability right up his sanctimonious ass.


    She trudged up the stairs and down the hall to her old bedroom, moved the filing boxes off her bed and onto the treadmill that had evidently taken up residence there since her last visit, and sat down. She felt like she ought to cry. She wanted to cry. Sitting on your childhood bed at your father¡¯s funeral was supposed to be the Moment to Cry. But instead she just wondered who the hell had moved the treadmill in here. Probably Tyler.


    She looked around her room with dry eyes. It was mostly a storage room now, haphazardly stacked with square plastic tubs and repurposed Amazon boxes, topped off with a recent layer of medical odds and ends from Dad¡¯s palliative care. The only remaining vestiges of her childhood existence were the quilt on the twin bed and a few faded rectangular silhouettes on the wallpaper where her pictures used to hang. She still had some of the better framed botanical prints in her apartment, but she had left the illustrations she had drawn herself here. They must have been trashed. Too bad¡ªsome of them were pretty good. Western hemlock (Tsuga heterophylla), milkweed (Asclepias speciosa), balsamroot (Balsamorhiza sagittata). Blackberry, obviously (Rubus armeniacus). She rarely got the chance to sketch her subjects anymore, but hand-drawn illustrations were pass¨¦ anyway.


    After enough time had passed that she was confident no tears were coming, she sighed, tugged the wrinkles out of her dour black dress, and stood. She probably should go socialize. For Mom. She opened the door.


    Someone stood in the hallway, just outside her door. A man.


    Cassie halted uncertainly. She didn¡¯t know him.


    Did she?


    She couldn¡¯t tell; his back was to her. He was leaning against the banister, looking over the guests.


    He turned his head, then straightened up and stared at her, his face shadowed. He did not speak.


    Several heartbeats passed in silence. Cassie had just opened her mouth to ask him if he was looking for the bathroom when he finally spoke.


    ¡°Your father was a kind man. He will not be forgotten.¡±


    Cassie stared up at him, mouth still open. He had the greenest eyes she had ever seen. Bottle-green. Emerald. ¡°I-I¡¯m sorry,¡± she stuttered, finally finding her voice. ¡°Thank you. How did you know Dad? Or do you know Mom? There are so many people here, I¡¯m having trouble remembering everyone.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s all right,¡± he said solemnly. ¡°I''m an old friend.¡±


    Strange that a man Cassie¡¯s age would consider himself an old friend of either of her parents, but Cassie simply extended her hand and said, ¡°Pleased to meet you.¡±


    He looked at her hand for a moment, as if unsure what to do with it, then reached out with both of his hands and gently clasped hers between them. They were warm and dry.


    ¡°Well,¡± she said after a moment, reclaiming her hand and turning to look over the crowd again, hoping that would hide her blush. Cassie considered herself more or less inured to awkward social interactions after a decade of biology conference mixers, but this man was really putting that to the test. She cleared her throat and continued inanely, ¡°A lot of people came.¡±


    ¡°Yes.¡±


    Cassie watched him out of the corner of her eye. He was looking around with great interest, taking in everything from the photos on the wall to the remains of the buffet below to the potted plants peeking out from shelves and end tables, and running his fingers absently over the buttons in the cuffs of his suit jacket. For something he seemed to be so unused to wearing, it was remarkably well tailored.


    ¡°I¡¯ve never been inside before,¡± he murmured, gazing contemplatively at a fern (Nephrolepis obliterata) potted in a ceramic bowl. ¡°It¡¯s wonderful.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll pass that along to Mom,¡± Cassie replied. ¡°She takes a lot of pride in her homemaking.¡± Cassie thought guiltily of her disaster zone of a bedroom and wished she had shut the door behind her.


    ¡°This house is full of life.¡± The man closed his eyes for a moment. ¡°I was afraid to come¡ªI thought it would feel dead. But it doesn¡¯t.¡±


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    Cassie was becoming increasingly sure she¡¯d met him before. Something about his halting cadence felt deeply familiar, and he was speaking to her as if he already knew her. He¡¯d said he was an old friend. Pleased to meet you was probably an inadvertent insult. She opened her mouth to apologize and ask his name when her phone buzzed.


    ¡°Oh, sorry, excuse me.¡± Cassie fished out her phone and turned away. It was an email from her boss, asking her to change several key sections in the latest proposal. She¡¯d try to get to that tonight. She dashed off a quick reply, then silenced her notifications and put it away again, turning back to the man. ¡°Sorry,¡± she said again. ¡°Work.¡±


    ¡°Your work means a lot to you.¡±


    ¡°Yes, well.¡± Cassie shrugged a shoulder. She spent too much time with her job. This job, anyway. It had sent runners through her life until there wasn¡¯t really any time that she was not effectively on call. But that¡¯s not something she wanted to talk about with this person, ¡°old friend¡± or not.


    ¡°Cass?¡± Matt poked his head up the stairs. ¡°Tyler wants you.¡±


    She turned to him, stepping away from the conversation with relief. ¡°What for?¡±


    ¡°A picture.¡±


    ¡°A picture? At a funeral? Are you serious?¡±


    Matt shifted uncomfortably. ¡°He¡ª¡±


    ¡°No, it¡¯s fine. Whatever.¡± She suddenly remembered the man was standing there too, an audience to her rudeness. She flushed. ¡°Oh, uh, excuse me, I have to go¡ª¡±


    ¡°No, of course.¡± He nodded cordially to Matt, who was peering at him with a how-do-I-know-you expression on his face. ¡°See you later.¡±


    Tyler¡¯s wife, it transpired, was the one who wanted to take the picture; Tyler himself had the good sense to act a little embarrassed. But Mom didn¡¯t seem to mind, preoccupied as she was with keeping a little black-clad grandchild from squirming out of her grasp. Another bounced up and down in Tyler¡¯s arms, a third at his feet, while a fourth gestated prominently in his wife¡¯s ruched black maternity dress. Cassie marveled at the woman¡¯s fortitude, and felt the burden of ¡°family expansion¡± lifted somewhat. Tyler clearly didn¡¯t need sibling backup on that front.


    She looked up once while the church friend pressed into photography duties fussed with the settings on her phone. Cassie wasn¡¯t sure why this friend in particular had been selected; her glasses were so thick, they lensed her eyes into enormous distorted orbs. The man was still standing at the banister, watching the gathering and plucking at his suit. Watching her, specifically. It was easy to tell; his green eyes were almost luminous against his face. But when she looked up again, he was gone.


    ?


    Cassie awoke sometime in the night. The guests had long since departed; except for the slight creaking of the old swing set outside, the house was silent. Matt was at his apartment, working on some big contract, and Tyler and his brood had left for their own home. Tyler, evidently forgetting that Cassie had already put in for the whole week off work, had tried to guilt her into staying; after all, being in academia, surely she must have ¡°nothing else to do.¡± Cassie let him dig his verbal hole for the pleasure of watching him have to climb back out of it when she reminded him.


    Now it was just her and Mom and a big house that made occasional distant gurgling noises for no apparent reason.


    She would have liked the sight of her childhood room to have been reassuring, but the clutter rendered the moonlit landscape almost alien. The room was strange to her. Even the smell was strange. It smelled of dust and disuse.


    Her fingers picked at the stitching on her quilt. Mom had made it as a baby blanket before she was born, then expanded it to fit her bed as she got older. It was so worn down by now, the patches had patches. At least this part of her room remained intact, even when everything else changed around it.


    Cassie stared out the window, wondering what had woken her. The moonlight was shining into her room, illuminating the treadmill and the patches of wall where the pictures weren¡¯t. The blackberry sketch used to hang just beyond the foot of her bed; now it was bare wallpaper. She¡¯d dreamed about the blackberry, hadn¡¯t she? She looked out the window again. The moonlight shone on the blackberry bramble, too. A few late flowers gleamed white.


    The boy¡ªshe¡¯d been dreaming about the boy in the bramble! Cassie hadn¡¯t thought about him for years. The memories felt strangely murky, clouded by more than just the passage of time. A neighbor¡¯s son, about her age, always there when she went out in the yard. He¡¯d made a little fort¡ªmore of a bower, really, barely big enough for them to stand¡ªinside the largest part of the blackberry bush, just on the other side of the fence. She¡¯d made sure to keep the gate free of blackberry vines so she could slip through to him. To have a tea-party, to draw pictures, to read a book, to plot world domination, to complain about her brothers. He told her fables about the forest¡ªsome funny, some sad. Sometimes they just sat silently in the little hollow, huddled like rabbits. In the dream, she was little, and crying. He had his skinny whipcord arms wrapped around her and was whispering something in her ear.


    She couldn¡¯t remember more than that. Her dreams used to be so much sharper, almost eidetic. That had changed too, somewhere along the way.


    Her eyes focused suddenly on the backyard. Was that a person? The shadow looked like a man, standing behind the old swing set, almost in the blackberry. Cassie watched the shadow for a long time, but its only movement was the shifting of leaves in the wind.


    She meant to make breakfast for Mom the next morning, but when she came downstairs in her sweatpants Mom was already at the stove converting leftover funeral potatoes into some sort of hash in the frying pan.


    ¡°Good morning,¡± she said lightly. ¡°Hot water in the kettle.¡±


    ¡°Morning.¡± Cassie puttered around the kitchen until she found the instant coffee and cocoa mix. ¡°How¡¯re you doing?¡±


    Mom considered the question carefully. ¡°Better,¡± she said finally, and turned her attention back to the hash.


    ¡°That¡¯s good,¡± Cassie replied. That was the extent of the conversation until they had each finished their breakfast. Cassie started loading the dishwasher while Mom gazed thoughtfully out the window. ¡°I should work on the yard.¡±


    ¡°Okay.¡± Cassie shut the dishwasher and wiped her hands. ¡°I¡¯ll help.¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t have papers to grade?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s summer, Mom.¡±


    ¡°Oh. You¡¯re not doing any research?¡±


    ¡°I am, just not this week.¡±


    ¡°Ah.¡± Mom nodded vaguely. ¡°I¡¯ll go find the gloves.¡±


    They weeded in silence for half an hour, working their way through the raised bed closest to the kitchen. It was normally an herb garden, but right now it was clumps of woodsorrel (Oxalis stricta) and a few struggling garlic shoots. Cassie nibbled on the woodsorrel as she went along. ¡°When do you want to tackle that blackberry?¡± she asked, yellow flower bobbing as she spoke.


    ¡°Goodness.¡± Mom straightened up and shaded her eyes. ¡°Not yet, I¡¯ll have to work up to it. Let¡¯s get through the beds first at least.¡±


    ¡°Sounds good.¡±


    ¡°Might take a few days.¡±


    ¡°I have all week.¡±


    They moved on to the vegetable bed. ¡°Mom, do you remember that neighbor kid I used to play with all the time?¡±


    Mom wrestled a bolted cabbage out of the dirt before answering. ¡°Who?¡±


    ¡°There was a boy. My age, skinny, dark hair. We used to play in the blackberry bush.¡±


    Mom straightened up, hand on her hip, and stared. ¡°Surely you¡¯re not talking about the boy you used to have little tea parties with?¡±


    ¡°Yes,¡± said Cassie, puzzled. ¡°Him.¡±


    Mom laughed. Cassie was so shocked she nearly inhaled the woodsorrel stem. This was the first time she had heard Mom laugh since Dad got sick. ¡°Oh, sweetheart,¡± she chuckled. ¡°That was an imaginary friend!¡±


    The woodsorrel fell from Cassie¡¯s open mouth. ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°None of the neighbors even had kids when you were growing up. Lord knows why you felt the need to invent another little boy to play with when you had your brothers¡ªI would have expected a little girl, at least¡ªbut he wasn¡¯t real. I think he may have been a fairy at one point.¡± She laughed again and pulled Cassie into a tight hug. ¡°I¡¯m astonished you remembered him at all, let alone as a real person! It was just the sweetest thing, you disappearing into the underbrush with a toy or an extra sandwich for your little friend. I wish I remembered his name! You drew pictures of him and everything. I kept ahold of one; I¡¯ll have to see if I can find it.¡± She planted a firm kiss on Cassie''s head and released her, smiling. ¡°Thank you.¡±

 Chapter 2. Tell Me About Your Botany

    The front door slammed so hard it made a kitchen windowpane rattle.


    Cassie jumped. It was Tyler. No one else slammed the door; it was hard to slam, solid and heavy, but Tyler slammed doors just to make a sound.


    Mom was taking an afternoon nap, which was unusual for her; clearly, she needed the rest. Cassie wondered if she¡¯d slept at all during the final days of Dad¡¯s illness. The pain had made it hard for him to sleep, despite the medication, and Mom hadn¡¯t wanted him to face that alone. Even when Cassie had been there, ostensibly to give Mom some time to herself, Mom had still sat with him. Cassie hoped Tyler¡¯s excessively loud entrance wouldn¡¯t wake her up.


    Cassie stayed sitting at the kitchen table, sipping at a glass of water, and waited to see what brought Tyler over. He must want something.


    ¡°Mom!¡± he bellowed.


    ¡°Shut up!¡± Cassie hissed. ¡°Mom¡¯s taking a nap.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re kidding,¡± he replied, coming into the kitchen. He made a beeline to the fridge and pulled out a piece of pie, then grabbed a plate and fork from the drying rack and sat down at the table.


    ¡°Why are you here?¡± She edged back a bit. He was wearing a staggering amount of aftershave.


    ¡°I gotta talk to Mom,¡± he said, between bites.


    ¡°She¡¯s sleeping.¡±


    Tyler hesitated. ¡°Well, it¡¯s kind of important.¡±


    ¡°It can¡¯t wait until tomorrow? We just had the funeral.¡±


    Tyler put down his fork and folded his hands on the table. ¡°It¡¯s time Mom sold the house.¡±


    He waited, probably for Cassie to start yelling, but she was too stunned to do anything but repeat him. ¡°Sell the house?¡±


    ¡°Yes,¡± he said, ¡°sell the house. It¡¯s really too big for Mom to take care of by herself. Look at how bad the garden has gotten. There¡¯s a ton of money locked up in this property¡ªnot so much the house itself, but the land. Real estate is doing well right now, but who knows when the market is going to go south? Everyone¡¯s predicting it. I even know a guy¡­¡±


    Cassie watched him speak as her hands tightened on the table. She could feel her face growing hot, which she knew from bitter experience meant she was flushing bright tomato red. Eventually, Tyler wound up his spiel and waited for Cassie¡¯s response.


    Cassie took a deep breath, and then another, because the first had felt so good in her tight chest.


    ¡°Get out.¡±


    ¡°Cassie,¡± said Tyler, ¡°you¡¯re not listening.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re right; I¡¯m not. You are not,¡± she spat, ¡°going to approach a widow the day after her husband was buried and tell her she needs to sell her house!¡±


    ¡°I know, I know.¡± Tyler patted the air in supercilious placation. ¡°The timing¡¯s not great, death-wise, but we have to move on this. Do you want Mom to be destitute in ten years? This house is worth a lot of money, but we have to move on it quickly!¡±


    ¡°How much commission are you getting?¡± Cassie demanded.


    ¡°What?¡± Tyler flushed.


    ¡°How much money?¡±


    ¡°I can see there¡¯s no reasoning with you.¡± Tyler pushed his chair in roughly. ¡°I¡¯ll be back later.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t bother!¡± she snarled.


    She waited until the door slammed before she cried. How dare he. How dare he come here, the dirt still fresh on their father¡¯s grave, trying to score a deal? Let some developer raze it to the ground and put in modern housing that was elegant and impersonal. Open-concept concrete-countered subway-tiled-backsplash bullshit.


    And the worst part was that he was right.


    She swallowed.


    The house ought to be sold.


    Cassie walked numbly out the kitchen door and stood on the deck, staring at the backyard without seeing it. Mom had just planted a row of zucchini seeds. You couldn¡¯t sell a house with zucchini seeds waiting to sprout.


    Someone was standing in the backyard.


    Cassie was so surprised she didn¡¯t even jump; she simply stood in place while her brain frantically tried to process how long the person had been standing there.


    ¡°Good morning,¡± said the man from the funeral.


    ¡°Hi.¡± Cassie still felt like she was running about three steps behind. ¡°Good morning. What are you doing here?¡±


    ¡°I thought I¡¯d come see how you were doing.¡±


    ¡°No. I mean¡ª¡± Cassie gesticulated broadly. ¡°Why are you in the backyard?¡±


    The man looked around with an expression of vague bemusement on his face, as though he only just now realized he was in a backyard. ¡°You¡¯re out here,¡± he replied, ¡°and Tyler just came out the front door looking angry.¡±


    Cassie cracked a wry half-smile; she¡¯d probably sneak around the back to avoid an angry Tyler too. ¡°Well, Mom¡¯s napping, but I can let her know you stopped by. I¡¯m sure she¡¯ll appreciate it.¡±


    He gazed at her in silence for a moment, face unreadable, before saying quietly, ¡°I came to see you.¡±


    ¡°I¡ªoh.¡± Cassie was suddenly acutely conscious of her stained sweatpants and mismatched socks, and hair that had been unceremoniously piled into something resembling a pineapple on the top of her head. Thank god she was at least wearing a bra; she almost hadn¡¯t bothered. The man¡¯s dark hair was wild and his face was scruffy with a few day¡¯s growth of beard, but at least he was wearing real pants. ¡°Please, come in.¡±


    She sat him at the kitchen table and immediately busied herself in a cabinet so she wouldn¡¯t have to look at him with her flame-red face. ¡°Tea? Coffee?¡±


    ¡°Just water, please.¡±


    Cassie held the glass under the refrigerator spigot with a sweaty hand, feeling his eyes on her back. ¡°Do you have the day off work?¡± Smooth. She handed her guest the glass of water and retreated to the other side of the table.


    ¡°No.¡±


    Cassie waited for an explanation, but he just took a long drink of water. His coarse black hair reached nearly to his shoulders in unkempt strands, and brushed the collar of his plain black t-shirt as he tilted his head back to drink. The sinews of his neck stood out under his olive skin before descending into the lean musculature of his chest and shoulders. She surreptitiously glanced below the table on a hunch: his worn leather boots were coated with dirt. And then the green intensity of his eyes was on her again and she had to look away.


    ¡°You¡¯ve been gardening,¡± he declared, putting down his glass.


    ¡°Yes,¡± Cassie replied, looking down at her outfit and feeling herself redden even further. ¡°I don¡¯t normally dress like this.¡±


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    ¡°Do you garden often?¡±


    ¡°Not as often as I¡¯d like.¡± Cassie finally looked up at him and found him listening intently, waiting for her to continue. ¡°I have a tiny little apartment near the university,¡± she explained. ¡°There¡¯s a balcony, but it¡¯s about three foot square and the neighbors below me smoke constantly, so I¡¯m hardly ever out there. I¡¯ve got pots all over the railing and hanging from above, but it¡¯s not like this.¡± She looked wistfully out at the yard. ¡°I miss this.¡± Her stomach turned over when she remembered just how much more she would miss it when the house was gone.


    ¡°What do you grow?¡±


    ¡°Herbs, mostly. Basil, mint, thyme, cilantro, parsley, rosemary. The hanging plants are varieties of tomato.¡±


    ¡°Those are all very nice plants,¡± he said seriously, ¡°except maybe rosemary. She¡¯s very pushy.¡±


    ¡°She?¡± Cassie chuckled.


    The man stilled.


    Instant remorse; this man clearly did not understand teasing. ¡°I¡¯m sorry,¡± Cassie rushed out. ¡°I¡¯ve been known to get pretty sentimental about plants myself. Occupational hazard.¡±


    After a moment of looking at her face as if to memorize her features, he nodded. ¡°What is your occupation?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m a postdoctoral research assistant at the university¡¯s phylogenetics lab,¡± she replied, tucking a leg up. ¡°My thesis was on systematic botany.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re a botanist?¡±


    ¡°Yes.¡±


    It was as though the sun had dawned on his face, so bright was his sudden smile. His green eyes shone with excitement. ¡°A botanist!¡± His laugh filled the kitchen, rich with genuine delight. ¡°That¡¯s wonderful!¡± He reached forward and clasped her hands and squeezed. ¡°Tell me about your botany!¡±


    Off-kilter from his unexpected exuberance, the first thing that came to Cassie¡¯s mind were snippets of her thesis. It was wildly inappropriate for a layperson. But he listened keenly, eyes never leaving her face as she rambled through taxonomic classifications and assay methodologies. His hands were as warm as the green-filtered sun that crept along the kitchen wall.


    A sudden creak from above made Cassie jump. She snatched her hands back unthinkingly, wincing as something scraped her knuckle. She absently rubbed the sting without looking down. ¡°I¡¯m sure I¡¯ve talked your ear off with plant minutiae. Sorry.¡±


    ¡°You didn¡¯t,¡± he replied softly, still smiling. ¡°And you don¡¯t need to apologize. Never apologize for your passion.¡±


    Cassie flushed so hard she thought her cheeks must be radiating heat. ¡°I¡ª¡±


    Another creak sounded from above. They both looked at the ceiling. ¡°Your mother is awake.¡±


    ¡°Yep.¡± Cassie stood. Her guest did the same, swinging his long legs out from under the table before unfolding to his full height. Cassie looked up at him, floundering for words again. ¡°I should¡ªI have a lot to help Mom with.¡±


    ¡°Gardening.¡± He smiled again. ¡°I¡¯ll see you later.¡± Cassie opened her mouth to offer to walk him out the front door like a civilized person, but before she could say anything he loped to the kitchen door, slid it open, and stepped off the deck.


    By the time Cassie collected herself enough to follow him¡ªand shout advice on working the finickey lock on the gate to the side yard¡ªhe had already disappeared. She walked back into the house and shut the door, then stood blankly in the middle of the kitchen, listening to the sounds of an old house bearing the weight of a grieving wife as she prepared for her day. No sounds from the yard; either that man was the sneakiest gate-whisperer to ever cross the property, or he had vanished off the face of the earth. Or maybe the gate had been left open? She¡¯d have to check.


    She rubbed her hand again and looked down at it in consternation. How on earth did she get a scrape like that? It was even bleeding a little. But he hadn¡¯t been wearing any jewelry, had he? Cassie shook her head. She¡¯d ask Mom what his story was. There was no way a guy that weird didn¡¯t have a story.


    Jesus Christ¡ªshe didn¡¯t know his name. She still hadn¡¯t asked. For that matter¡ªdid he even know hers?


    What a pair of idiots they made.


    ?


    Mom had decided the next day was the day to clean out the office.


    Cassie was helping with the two paper grocery bag¡¯s worth of unopened mail. Most of it was junk, of course, but a few letters had managed to end up there unnoticed. It was mindless, but it kept her busy.


    ¡°So tell me about work.¡± Mom was going through boxes of packing peanuts, making sure there wasn¡¯t anything lost in them. She was wearing gardening gloves, in case of spiders. She hated spiders.


    Cassie sighed. She¡¯d been pleased to talk about her thesis earlier, but that wasn¡¯t what Mom was asking. ¡°It¡¯s okay.¡±


    ¡°Okay? What does that mean?¡±


    Cassie took a breath and held it for a moment, thinking. Mom obviously smelled blood in the water. ¡°My boss stresses me out, that¡¯s all.¡±


    ¡°Why?¡±


    ¡°He¡¯s just very driven. He wants the best for the department, and it¡¯s a lot of work.¡±


    ¡°How so?¡±


    ¡°Well, the grant proposals, for example. He emails me about them around the clock, and expects an instantaneous reply. If he doesn¡¯t get one, he calls.¡±


    Mom looked over the edge of a box. Her eyes were concerned, but the effect was somewhat ruined by the packing peanuts clinging to her frizzy hair. ¡°Have you talked to HR?¡±


    Cassie shook her head. ¡°No, that¡¯s not really an HR issue. He¡¯s just trying to help the department.¡±


    Mom nodded. ¡°Looks like what you need is to set some boundaries.¡±


    Cassie nodded back solemnly. ¡°Be right back. I need to pee.¡±


    She got to the bathroom and stuffed her face into a towel before she started laughing. The very idea. Mom was such a doormat, and she thought Cassie needed some boundaries?


    Cassie used the toilet and washed her hands for verisimilitude then went back to the office.


    Mom was sorting through a drawer of assorted household detritus now: unused gift cards, mystery keys, tangled chargers for small devices that had long since died and been replaced. ¡°Weren¡¯t you applying for a grant of your own?¡± Mom asked. ¡°To work in a field?¡±


    Cassie smiled. The misinterpretation was understandable, given the nature of her work. ¡°I submitted a proposal for independent fieldwork, yes. Field Evaluation in Ecoregions 2-4 of Apomixis and Propagation in Rosaceae Genera. It¡¯s to, uh¡ª¡± Cassie cast about for a comprehensible description. ¡°A grant to help further define classification structure in the Rosaceae family of plants.¡±


    Cassie could sense the tremendous effort of will her mother marshaled to sound earnest as she exclaimed, ¡°Oh, how exciting!¡± while trying to shake two tangled sets of earbuds apart. She eventually settled for picking at them carefully. ¡°Will you get to name a new species?¡±


    ¡°If I can adequately justify my rationale for delineating a new...¡± This was not going to go anywhere; Mom was now squinting at the earbuds in frustration. ¡°Maybe, if I¡¯m lucky.¡±


    ¡°When do you hear about winning the grant?¡±


    ¡°Well, first of all, I¡¯m probably not going to win it,¡± Cassie said bluntly. ¡°It¡¯s intensely competitive and I¡¯m probably one of the only solo submissions for this one. Second of all, nobody¡¯s winning it right now, because the funding for the grant is on hold pending some sort of NSF politics. They were supposed to have selected winners already, but now the earliest we¡¯ll hear is¡ª¡± Cassie checked the date on her phone. ¡°Oh, maybe as early as next week, actually.¡±


    Funny how she¡¯d come unmoored from time after only a few days away. Honestly, it was probably best that she¡¯d forgotten; less opportunity to get her hopes up. She wasn¡¯t sure this grant board would take a solo application seriously: she¡¯d have to arrange for her own laboratory time in the second phase, she¡¯d have no university resources automatically at her disposal, and she hadn¡¯t listed any senior experts as consultants. It would just be her, hiking around with nothing but a few gigs of cited research on her laptop and a rucksack of specimen collection and preservation equipment. For the entire first phase.


    God, she wanted to win this grant.


    ¡°Well, even if you don¡¯t win it this time,¡± Mom was saying as she leafed through an old hanging file that had fallen to the bottom of a drawer, ¡°you can always try again, right?¡±


    ¡°I can, yes. Next year.¡± Cassie pressed her mouth into a thin line and dug into the pile of paperwork excavated from the drawer Mom was currently pawing through. ¡°And in the meantime, I am gainfully employed in my desired career area, so really, I can¡¯t com¡ª¡±


    ¡°Oh!¡± Mom exclaimed suddenly. ¡°Here it is!¡±


    She reached into the bottom of the drawer, set aside a handful of creased report cards (all A¡¯s except for a C in PE¡ªmust be Matt¡¯s), and pulled out a sheet of paper. She handed it to Cassie with a smile.


    Cassie peered at it. It was thick white construction paper, torn from a drawing pad, bearing a colored-pencil drawing whose vibrancy had only faded a little over the years. Two figures stood to the left: a boy leaning back to hurl a pale yellow ball, villainous face dominated by angry eyebrows, and a smaller, rounder boy wearing an exaggerated frown. Lest there be any doubt, Cassie had helpfully labeled them as Tyler Harris and Matthew Harris in precise black lettering, with ruler-straight arrows pointing to each.


    On the right was the blackberry bramble.


    Even if it hadn¡¯t been identified as such, both in English and in Latin, it would have been clear; she¡¯d taken care to draw a few leaves and flowers in the foreground of the appropriate color and shape. The rest was a more abstract tangle of green and brown pencil, ticked with thorns. In the center of the tangle was a hollow space, inhabited by two other figures: long-haired Cassandra Harris, arms held stiffly before her as though to ward off Tyler¡¯s pitch, and a boy.


    He alone was unlabeled. He towered behind Cassie, hands at his sides, rendered mostly in black, brown, and purple. For some inexplicable reason, the drawing omitted his feet¡ªbut even more striking was his face. His wild black snarl of hair was ticked with thorns as well, and the eyes that gazed from within it were a piercing green.

 Chapter 3. Imaginary Friend

    Cassie, age nine, hunched intently over a book within the bramble bower. All was quiet but for the rustle and chirp of a family of finches, and the occasional sound of pages turning.


    There was a slam, and a shout. Her brothers came thumping down the deck steps, thunderous and uneven. She ignored them until they started calling her name.


    The boy looked up from his own book only for a moment. ¡°You should ignore them,¡± he said. ¡°They just want to play tetherball.¡±


    Cassie agreed. She hooked her hair behind her ears and curled over the book again, but the shouting continued.


    ¡°Cass!¡± Tyler called. ¡°Mom said you have to play with us while she¡¯s at the store!¡±


    ¡°No she didn¡¯t!¡± Cassie shouted back immediately. The boy sighed.


    ¡°She did too!¡± There was a sudden violent rustle; Tyler had thrown the tetherball at the bush.


    The boy stood slowly, folding the book shut. The birds fell silent.


    ¡°Stop!¡± cried Cassie, jumping to her feet as well.


    ¡°Come out!¡± Tyler ordered. ¡°Come play tetherball!¡±


    ¡°C¡¯mon, Tyler,¡± Matt argued, ¡°let¡¯s just play by ourselves.¡±


    ¡°Let go,¡± Tyler said irritably; Matt must have grabbed his sleeve. A moment later, the bramble juddered under another blow from the ball. A few dead leaves filtered down from above and fell into Cassie''s hair. The hollow began to grow dark, as though the sun had passed behind a cloud. The boy didn¡¯t move.


    ¡°Stop it!¡± Cassie cried again, voice rising. ¡°You¡¯re hurting the blackberry!¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re hurting the blackberry!¡± Tyler mimicked, pitching his voice to a shrieking mockery of Cassie¡¯s. ¡°I¡¯m coming in to your stupid fort.¡±


    ¡°No!¡± The book tumbled from Cassie''s hands. ¡°Don¡¯t!¡±


    ¡°Just leave her alone, Tyler,¡± Matt urged, but there was a wrenching rustle from Tyler as he tried to force his way in. ¡°How do you even get in here? Ow!¡±


    ¡°Tyler, don¡¯t, I mean it!¡± Cassie yelled. There was another yelp of pain. All she could see of the boy in the deepening gloom was his eyes. The smell of earth and green rot filled her nose. ¡°Tyler, back out! Back out!¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m trying!¡± Tyler¡¯s vitriol had changed to alarm. ¡°Cassie, I¡¯m¡ªOW!¡ªI¡¯m stuck!¡± He began to thrash. The air tightened. Wood creaked.


    ¡°No, stop¡ªhold still!¡± With a last despairing glance at the shadow over her shoulder, Cassie slithered through the twisted brambles, feeling the thorns glide along the surface of the bare skin of her arms and comb the flyaways in her hair. There was a scream. ¡°I¡¯m coming out, just hold still!¡±


    She slipped through the half-open chain-link gate and ducked under the low green arch of the blackberry tunnel into the backyard. She squinted against the sudden brilliance of the sunlight and staggered into Matt, who was tugging in vain at both of Tyler¡¯s arms, trying to haul him out of the bramble. Tyler was ensnared up to his chest in the dense tangle; he¡¯d lost his footing entirely, and his shirt was speckled with blood. Matt tugged again, grunting with the effort, and Tyler howled wordlessly in response, tears streaming down his face.


    ¡°Stop!¡± Cassie screamed. She knocked Matt¡¯s hands away. ¡°Just stop moving for a second!¡±


    ¡°Get me out,¡± Tyler blubbered. ¡°It hurts!¡± But he did as she asked and held still.


    ¡°Okay, now stand up really slowly.¡±


    Tyler worked his feet back under himself, sniveling. Cassie took a deep breath. ¡°Now say you¡¯re sorry.¡±


    ¡°You¡ª!¡±


    ¡°Do it!¡±


    ¡°Fine! I¡¯m sorry!¡±


    ¡°Now unhook all the thorns from your shirt. Keep moving real slow. Matt and I can help. Every time you feel a new snag, stop moving and pull it out.¡±


    Working gingerly, they managed to extract Tyler from the blackberry bush thorn by thorn. His shirt was ruined; smears of blackberry juice and droplets of blood seeped together, and the fabric had been torn in several places. His jeans had a couple stains but would live to see another day. Matt ran to get the antiseptic and bandaids while Cassie helped pull the shirt over Tyler¡¯s head.


    ¡°It was like it grabbed me.¡± Tyler winced as the shirt unstuck from a cut. ¡°I was stepping in through the gap and then both my feet got stuck at the same time. Ow!¡± Matt had begun a clumsy Neosporin application.


    ¡°You just have to move real slow and smooth, or else the thorns catch,¡± Cassie replied.


    ¡°You don¡¯t move slow,¡± Tyler accused.


    ¡°I have practice,¡± Cassie snapped.


    She was not gentle with the bandaids.


    ?


    The peach tree (Prunus persica) was furthest away from the blackberry bramble, so that was where Cassie started pruning. She needed to think.


    It was a simple thing, recognizing troubling possibilities: no dithering, no denial, no willful suppression of reason or intuition. More difficult was deciding what to do about them, once recognized.


    The peach tree was going to look alarmingly bald when she was done, but freshly-pruned trees always did. Mom knew the drill, and joined her with the shorter shears on the lower side after a while.


    ¡°Aside from your boss,¡± she asked, as though they had never ceased their conversation earlier, ¡°how¡¯s work?¡±


    ¡°Mostly good,¡± Cassie grunted. One of the branches was in an awkward place. ¡°The research itself is going all right. I really like the other two research assistants; we have a game night every month, and we go hiking every couple weeks. One of the lab techs bakes cookies and brings them in on Fridays.¡±


    ¡°Are they good?¡±


    ¡°Yes, very.¡±


    ¡°Well that¡¯s nice.¡±


    ¡°Mm-hmm.¡±


    The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    They lapsed into silence again. It took a moment for Cassie to realize Mom had stopped pruning and was staring blankly up at the sky.


    ¡°Mom?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry.¡± Mom looked down and wiped her eyes. ¡°I feel like I¡¯ve forgotten how to talk. About anything other than your dad, I mean. I keep thinking I need to check on his drip or figure out when the best time is to call the doctor, and then I remember... And then I remember that my daughter is here and I have no idea what her life has been like for the past¡­ however many months. Years.¡± Her voice hitched. ¡°I¡¯ve forgotten the living.¡±


    ¡°Oh, Mom¡ª¡± Cassie dropped everything to the ground and pulled her mother into a hug. ¡°I don¡¯t feel forgotten at all. And my life has been really boring for quite a while.¡± Until now. ¡°You haven¡¯t missed anything. If there had been anything important I would have told you whenever I came to visit Dad.¡±


    Would she have, actually? It was hard to know. She had been so numb with grief and resignation every time she came, it was like an out-of-body experience. Surely she must have cast her eyes upon the backyard innumerable times during those visits, and yet the state of it came as a fresh shock, as though seen for the first time, during the funeral. She wondered what else she had missed.


    Mom sniffed and gave a watery chuckle. ¡°Yes, I eavesdropped as much as I could on all your conversations with him. Plants, plants, and more plants. He was always so good at indulging your passions. If you loved it, he loved it. Did you know he subscribed to the International Journal of Plant Sciences when you started your PhD?¡±


    Cassie had seen a stack of them in the master bathroom while helping Mom clean it. ¡°Oh, that¡¯s where those came from.¡±


    ¡°He wanted to be able to have ¡®topical conversations¡¯ with you, he told me. Then he got into it and talked my ear off until I reminded him that you¡¯re the botanist and he should leave me be and text you instead.¡±


    Cassie had saved every single one of his texts, even the ones that were just a scattered collection of plant emojis punctuated by a thumbs up. Especially those.


    Mom brushed her hair back and sighed. ¡°And of course I¡¯m still just talking about him.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s okay, Mom.¡±


    ¡°Yes, I¡¯m sure my therapist would agree. But I want to talk about you.¡±


    Cassie hesitated. ¡°Honestly, I¡¯d rather talk about Dad. Or you. But if you really want to, I can regale you with lab drama.¡±


    Her mother gave another chuckle, drier this time. ¡°Please do. I¡¯m all ears.¡±


    They moved to the pear tree (Pyrus communis) next as they chatted, which took most of the afternoon. The light was turning from gold to amber when Matt showed up with half a ¡°Condolences¡± cake from the guys at the firm and Mom went inside to start preparing dinner. She was still working her way through the funeral leftovers. Cassie stayed outside, stacking the heftier trimmings against the fence for winter kindling and tossed the remainder into the compost pile. When that was done, she stepped back to survey her work.


    She was stalling.


    A mosquito bit her neck. If she lingered much longer she would be eaten alive¡ªbut it wouldn¡¯t hurt to at least neaten the compost pile a bit. Cassie turned around to go get the rake.


    He stood there in the fading light, hands relaxed at his sides, watching her attentively. He cast a shadow; the rising breeze stirred his hair; the twilight gnats making a nuisance of themselves drifted around his head every bit as much as they did Cassie¡¯s.


    He had to be real.


    Had to be.


    Cassie held out her hand. ¡°Could you pass me the rake, please?¡±


    Wordlessly, he plucked the rake from where it was resting against the wall and brought it to her. She took it from him and gave it an experimental pass on the compost pile, climbing to the top as she went, and it raked just as it ever had. The rake was real, at least. She settled it tines-down in the pile and leaned on the pole, considering him thoughtfully from her perch. He returned her steady gaze.


    ¡°What¡¯s your name?¡± Cassie finally asked. An endless variety of polite alternatives of that question probably existed. I¡¯m so sorry, I can¡¯t recall your name. I didn¡¯t quite catch your introduction the first time. But if this man was willing to repeatedly arrive¡ªuninvited, unannounced, unobserved¡ªin her mother¡¯s backyard, she didn¡¯t owe him manners.


    And if he didn¡¯t exist at all, she owed him nothing.


    He looked faintly puzzled. ¡°You don¡¯t know my name?¡±


    ¡°Do you know mine?¡± she challenged.


    ¡°Of course I do,¡± he replied. ¡°Cassandra Nicole Harris.¡±


    Shit. Cassie tried to ignore how it made her feel, to hear him speak her name. Her full name, no less¡ªthat was troubling. She scrubbed a stray strand of hair away from her face with the back of her glove. ¡°I don¡¯t remember your name,¡± she said shortly. ¡°Sorry.¡±


    He smiled up at her. ¡°You¡¯ll just have to make one up for me, then.¡±


    Cassie smiled back in spite of herself. ¡°You got it, Hieronymus.¡± She used the rake to steady her descent from the pile. ¡°Not a good sign, you know,¡± she added as she pulled off her gloves.


    ¡°What¡¯s not a good sign?¡±


    ¡°Not having a name.¡±


    ¡°I have a name.¡±


    ¡°A name that I make up for you doesn¡¯t count, Edvard.¡±


    He looked inexplicably startled for a moment, then repeated firmly, ¡°I have a name.¡± He was soft-spoken enough that it was easy to miss how deep his voice was. He stepped closer to her, making Cassie aware again of his height. She didn¡¯t move away, but she gripped the rake harder as she looked up into his shadowed face.


    ¡°Why,¡± he asked, ¡°would it be a bad sign?¡±


    Because it would increase the chances that you¡¯re a figment of my imagination. ¡°Because,¡± she hedged, surprising herself with a facet of honesty, ¡°it makes it much harder to ask my mother about you.¡±


    She had meant to say something flippant, maybe even caustic, but that¡¯s not what came out. Oh well, this would do, even if it made her sound like some countryside Victorian virgin. A mama¡¯s girl.


    Obviously she was more of a daddy¡¯s girl.


    Abruptly, Cassie looked away, struggling to swallow around the lump in her throat. She busied herself with winnowing an errant strand of hair back into her braid, hoping to dash away the tears before they could be seen, but there were too many, dropping to the ground with just enough light left in the sky to betray them. Why now, why now. She pressed the gardening gloves to her eyes, face on fire with shame and hoping it was at least too dark to see how red she was.


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry,¡± she choked, mortified. ¡°I¡¯m sorry.¡± Then she was on her knees, a caricature of a woman gone mad with grief, humiliated and unable to stop, rake fallen over and gloves pressed so hard to her eyes that her retinas bloomed with abstract pattern, and still she couldn¡¯t stop the tears. ¡°I¡¯m sorry.¡±


    Suddenly he was holding her, long arms wrapped around her sobbing frame, gathering her to himself, murmuring in her ear with his deep soft voice resonating where her head rested against his chest. He felt so real, warm and solid and scratchy where his stubble caught at her hair¡ªbut he couldn¡¯t be. She was unhinged by the death of her father. She was having a psychotic break. She was manifesting literal daddy issues as some nonsense backyard apparition that drew from the legacy of her childhood imagination and hackneyed tropes of masculinity. She needed therapy and medication and probably better health insurance than what she got through the university.


    Now she was crying at the prospect of having to postpone her research, too. Madness sabbatical. Foolishness on top of tragedy.


    Still he cradled her, lips moving against her hair, further proof that he couldn¡¯t possibly be real. She would never allow someone she¡¯d met twice before, spoken to for a grand total of what, twenty minutes, to hold her like this. She¡¯d have hit him with the rake. Instead she curled into him, let his low croon wash over her, didn¡¯t even try to understand what he was saying. It didn¡¯t matter. She needed just a moment, just a moment longer, in the embrace of her delusion.


    When the last light of the sun had faded and the tears had dried to salty tracks on her face, Cassie rose to her feet. The breeze kept the mosquitos at bay, but away from the warmth of the man as he sat silently in the dirt, goosebumps swept over her skin.


    What does one say to one¡¯s hallucination after an episode?


    ¡°Thank you,¡± she croaked, not meeting his eye. Then she picked up the gloves, walked back to the house, and climbed the stairs of the deck, shivering.


    Matt flicked on the porch light and came out from the kitchen just as she reached the top. Judging by his face, she must look as ghastly as she felt. But something over her shoulder caught his attention, and his expression changed instantly from pity to surprise.


    ¡°Who the fuck is that?¡± he blurted.


    Cassie felt her stomach plummet to the center of the earth. She whirled around and caught sight of the man just as he disappeared into the gloom beyond the porch light¡¯s reach. She turned back to Matt, mouth open and no sound coming out.


    He kept squinting into the darkness. ¡°Isn¡¯t that the guy you were talking to at the funeral?¡±


    ¡°Yes,¡± Cassie finally managed.


    ¡°What¡¯s his name?¡±


    ¡°I have no idea,¡± Cassie replied.


    And she laughed so hard she started crying again.

 Chapter 4. Nothing More Valuable

    Tyler brought the real estate agent by the next day. She was petite and sharply dressed and spread her A¡¯s like a Chicagoan.


    Cassie drifted behind the two of them as they toured the house, attempting to project an aura of fatal melancholy, while her brother and the agent kept saying the word ¡°potential¡± to each other in self-satisfactory tones and taking pictures. Cassie didn¡¯t follow them out onto the backyard deck¡ªshe lurked in the kitchen, glowering over a muffin¡ªbut she could hear the agent exclaiming outside. The size! The view! Access to the park just on the other side of the fence! Nothing more valuable than adjacency to land that would never be developed, nothing.


    The agent gave Mom her business card with a many-zeroed number scratched on the back with a fountain pen that matched her suit. Mom accepted it with vague and noncommittal politeness, but Cassie saw her staring at it that night at the kitchen table, illuminated only by the dim yellow bulb over the stovetop, sipping tea and looking troubled.


    Cassie went upstairs and emailed the lab director to put in for another week off. Of course, came the reply. Take all the time you need, my condolences, please have Section 2.6 of the proposal ready tomorrow by close of business. She read the email and, in a fit of pique and self-loathing, stayed up until three in the morning furiously cobbling together grant content and interspersing it with FUCK YOUR FUNDING every few sentences, which she immediately deleted. She saved without sending, so she could expunge any wayward FUCKs with fresh eyes in the morning, and went to bed without looking out of the window even once.


    She dreamed about the boy in the bramble again¡ªor remembered him, as she fell asleep, before dreaming.


    It was winter. Cassie was bundled in an oversized wool poncho of Dad¡¯s from his groovier days, but the boy merely wore a thin black sweater. Too cold to read or draw, Cassie sat in the bramble bower admiring her steaming breath, fingers tucked in her armpits.


    ¡°Would you like to hear a story?¡± the boy asked. Cassie nodded.


    ¡°Once upon a time, in the hollows of an old oak, there lived a cicada and a colony of ants. Every summer morning, the cicada arranged her wings of black and gold, climbed to the very highest leaf on the very highest branch, and sang her songs to the world. She sang all day long with hardly a break to nibble on a twig for sustenance. All the creatures of the tree heard the beauty of her songs.¡±


    Cassie rubbed her nose and smiled at the notion of a cicada¡¯s incessant shrill drone being considered ¡°beautiful,¡± but didn¡¯t interrupt.


    ¡°None of the creatures had asked her to sing, of course, but it was in her nature, and it made their busy days more pleasant to have fine music to dance to as they worked. The birds sang counterpoint, and the bees hummed along.


    ¡°The ants heard in her music a war song. They are belligerent at the best of times, but that summer, buoyed by the vibrancy of the music, they struck against their neighbors. They raided the termite¡¯s nest. They stole acorns from the squirrels. No picnic basket within a mile was safe: sandwiches, chips, carrot sticks. Entire cans of root beer were carried away on their backs and stashed away in the vaults of the colony. If they were capable of singing, they would have chanted songs of triumph and success, but they were not; instead, they listened to the cicada¡¯s song and reveled.


    ¡°Then autumn came. The sap of the old oak slowed, and the cicada became hungry. One day, too weak to sing, she crawled to the doors of the ant colony. She could hear them inside, shouting among themselves and feasting. She had to knock quite hard, with five of her six legs, to be heard. A worker ant opened the door and snapped, ¡®What do you want?¡¯


    ¡°¡®Please,¡¯ said the cicada weakly, ¡®the sun is not shining and the sap has stopped flowing. I am cold and hungry. May I have some of your food?¡¯


    More ants came to the door to see what was going on. ¡®Why don¡¯t you have any food of your own?¡¯ called one.


    ¡®While you were busy raiding, I was busy singing,¡¯ explained the cicada. ¡®I know how much the creatures love when I sing. It makes the whole tree happy.¡¯


    ¡®While you were busy singing, we were busy raiding,¡¯ retorted another ant. ¡®This is our food. Go away.¡¯


    ¡®Please!¡¯ cried the cicada. ¡®I can see you have more than you need¡ªwhy, there¡¯s another raiding party, back with lovely lumps of sugar! How sweet it smells!¡¯


    The ants laughed at her. ¡®Go sing some more,¡¯ they jeered, ¡®maybe you can sing the tree¡¯s sap awake again! Try a little dance while you¡¯re at it!¡¯ And they slammed the door in her face.


    The cicada crawled away in despair and died.¡±


    Cassie turned to glare at the boy, objection on her lips, but he wasn¡¯t done. ¡°The ants forgot about the cicada in an instant,¡± he continued. ¡°Their raiding party had returned with enough sugar to feast for a week! Overjoyed, they set upon the lumps and ate until their abdomens were full to bursting. None of them realized they were eating sweet borax, laid around the perimeter of a picnic by humans who had lost one too many sandwiches to the ants¡¯ greed. The poison killed them all before the sun rose the next day.¡± The boy smiled beatifically. ¡°The end.¡±


    The author''s tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    Cassie¡¯s mouth hung open in incredulous silence for a moment before scolding, ¡°That¡¯s a terrible story!¡±


    The boy shrugged. ¡°Sometimes stories are terrible.¡±


    ¡°That sounded like a fable. Aren¡¯t fables supposed to have a moral?¡±


    ¡°They can, if you want.¡±


    ¡°What even was the moral of that story then?¡±


    He shrugged again. ¡°Don¡¯t be the cicada. Don¡¯t be the ants.¡±


    ¡°Who should I be, then?¡±


    He looked surprised. ¡°The oak, of course.¡±


    ?


    Cassie woke late the next morning, hot and disoriented. She hadn¡¯t closed the curtains last night; she was blanketed in sunshine as well as sheets. She stripped her sweaty pajamas off, grabbed the towel from where she¡¯d draped it over the treadmill, and marched straight down the hall into the shower. Mom was already outside gardening, judging by the intermittent noise of hose water flowing through the pipes. She¡¯d just have to wrestle the plumbing for her share of the water pressure. The walls gurgled.


    ¡°Oh good, you¡¯re up.¡± Mom didn¡¯t look up from her weeding. ¡°I¡¯m almost done with this bed¡ªI thought today would be a good day to finally do something about the blackberry. Maybe after lunch.¡±


    Cassie checked her phone; it was almost lunchtime. ¡°Shoot.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it, honey.¡± Mom pulled her gloves off and patted Cassie¡¯s shoulder. ¡°I¡¯ll go resuscitate a casserole.¡±


    Cassie put her gloves on and considered the blackberry bramble.


    In 1875, somebody cut down a Great Sequoia (Sequoiadendron giganteum) in California and shipped a 16-foot-diameter slice, in pieces, back east for the Centennial Exposition. Nobody believed it was real. It was too big. If she tried to convince anyone not familiar with the blackberries of the Pacific Northwest of the size of this bush, she would have the same problem; they would accuse her of perpetuating a hoax. It was over eight feet tall and spanned the entire width of the backyard; the neighbors to either side had kept it pruned back, but only barely. It sprawled another six or eight feet into the yard and some unknown amount into the wild parkland beyond the fence, completely obscuring whether it grew from this side or that. Probably both.


    A handful of bees buzzed around the last of the flowers, but the bush was well into the fruiting season already. Clusters of berries glowed in the summer sun, unripe magenta mixed with soft iridescent black. Cassie moved closer. She remembered eating them by the handful as a girl, not bothering to wash them, just blowing them free of sepals and cobwebs and eating them straight. There were summer pies, too, and jams and muffins and scones. Smoothies and pancakes, fruit leather and tarts. Even with the birds and rodents taking their tax, there were still more berries than the family could manage. Cassie would return to the house with her fingers stained pink and her tongue a velvety purple, then come back for more. And that was before it had grown to its current size.


    She reached forward to touch a ripe blackberry. It fell into her hand. Cassie blew it off and put it in her mouth. She didn¡¯t even have to chew; the blackberry melted on her tongue. Her mouth flooded with saliva as half-formed taste memories surged. She reached for another.


    She saw the tunnel then, low to the ground but surprisingly large. The passageway worn into the thicket from her youth would have been long overgrown by this point; this one must be from some animal. She squatted down and peered into the verdant gloom. It smelled like dirt and fruit. To her shock, the lower corner of the gate was visible from here, and it was open. She hesitated just long enough to hike up her socks before crawling in.


    It was more of a crouch-waddle, really, to keep her bare knees from getting sliced on rocks and cane. She moved slowly, head ducked low, letting the thorns glide harmlessly over her skin. The further in she went, the higher the ceiling became. The sounds of house and yard fell away, replaced by the rustle of creatures going about their business in the underbrush. By the time Cassie reached the gate, she was able to stand with a slight hunch. It was only open enough for her to squeeze by if she held her breath and eased herself through in parts: one leg first, one arm next, wedging the gate further open with her thigh so her hips and breasts could pass. She turned around once she had fully cleared the fence.


    He was waiting for her.


    Like an icon in a wild cathedral, he stood upright, alert, unmoving, cloaked in light and shadow and watching her without a sound. His face was serene, almost imperious. A circlet of thorns and leaves rested on his head; he held another in his hands.


    Cassie sank to her knees, robbed of speech and balance. Fortunately, the ground here was soft, springy duff, free of sharp things. Just as she remembered it.


    ¡°You,¡± she mouthed, still unable to speak.


    ¡°Me,¡± he agreed.


    Cassie found her voice. ¡°You¡¯re real.¡±


    He smiled. ¡°I am.¡±


    ¡°You were real the whole time.¡±


    He knelt before her, silently sinking into the duff a hand¡¯s breadth away, and laid the second circlet upon her head.


    ¡°Of course,¡± he said.


    And then he kissed her.


    If she hadn¡¯t been lightheaded before, she would be now. The kiss was soft, almost chaste, nothing more than the barest brush of his lips against hers. It was she who opened her mouth, inviting him, fingers digging into the floor of the hollow and tongue darting out to taste him. The response was instantaneous; he took her face between his hands and overpowered her tongue with his own, making a soft and hungry noise deep in his throat.


    ¡°Cassie?¡±


    Cassie broke the kiss, dizzy and appalled at her mother¡¯s timing. She looked up into gleaming green eyes as they drew away.


    ¡°Coming, Mom!¡± Cassie yelled, slightly hysterical. Good god, she sounded like a guilty teenager. May as well have screamed Anon, good nurse!


    ¡°We have to trim,¡± Cassie whispered. She phrased it as a statement, but they both knew it was a question. She worked her fingers in the duff nervously, awaiting his answer. His permission.


    After a moment, he smiled. ¡°That sounds very nice.¡±


    ¡°Thank you.¡± She could barely hear her own voice. She stood and slipped back through the gate, feeling the weight of his regard give her an unexpected grace. Her lips felt heavy and tender, and the crown on her head felt lighter than air.

 Chapter 5. Kissie Cassie

    Mom¡¯s eyebrows rose as Cassie emerged from the bramble. ¡°That was fast.¡±


    Cassie¡¯s brain jammed. ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°The crown.¡± Mom pointed at the blackberry circlet. ¡°I didn¡¯t realize you could make those so quickly.¡±


    ¡°Oh! Oh.¡± Cassie almost collapsed with relief. ¡°That. Yes.¡±


    ¡°I brought buckets to harvest the berries as we go along. I figured we could make pie tonight.¡±


    The memory of the druplets dissolving in her mouth made the ground unsteady again. ¡°That sounds fantastic,¡± she said, struggling to keep her voice even. ¡°Thanks Mom.¡±


    They set to work with shears and buckets, swaying slowly between the two as they went. Snip snip, pause to pick the berries, plop plop into the buckets. The trimmings piled up behind them as they worked in companionable silence. Snip snip, plop plop, pretending like she hadn¡¯t just kissed a nameless man in the bushes a dozen feet away. Kissie Cassie. Could he see her now? Was he watching? Who was he?


    What was he?


    She had more or less established the reality of his existence, since Matt had sighted him on at least two occasions. Unless she had hallucinated that moment with Matt, too? No. Cassie discarded the idea as soon as she had it; solipsistic turtles all the way down was no good. Almost as certain: he was the same person as the boy she had spent so much of her childhood with in the bramble. He seemed to have indicated as much, at least obliquely, and he definitely looked like an adult version of the boy she remembered. What were the odds that a real man perfectly resembled an imaginary boy? Particularly with such singular eyes? Not zero, but exceedingly low. Cassie tossed another handful of berries into the bucket.


    Which left two open questions: firstly, how could her mother¡ªboth her parents¡ªhave mistaken a real boy for an imaginary one? Not just once or twice, but dozens of times over a span of years. Hundreds, even. Shouldn¡¯t they have glimpsed him skulking into the bramble from the parkland? Heard his voice? True, he was soft-spoken and occasionally taciturn, but did they really think she was consuming double shares of snacks that regularly? Or just leaving sandwiches to molder in the underbrush? Surely her brothers would have noticed at some point and said something. Could that have been mistaken for humoring her, or harmless childhood folie ¨¤ deux, and simply glossed over or forgotten? Far from impossible, but still somewhat incredible.


    Secondly¡­ the hairs on Cassie¡¯s arms stood on end as she paused to take a sip of water and re-settle the circlet on her head. Secondly, there were the unaccountable memories of the boy. Some were merely unusual, like how often he went barefoot, or how thin his winter clothing was. Poverty could easily have explained that, as well as his interest in her food and, much more ravenously, her books. He never seemed to owe an adult insight into his whereabouts or activities: neglect, then. Unfortunate, but not unexplainable.


    It was the stranger memories, only now surfacing in dark anamnesis, that possessed her thoughts.


    A vague recollection of him asking the peach tree to grow an enormous peach in honor of the book he had just finished reading, James and the Giant Peach, which it did: a single, perfect fruit, inflating like a balloon until it was the size of a soccer ball, at which point Cassie became unsettled and asked it to stop. (What did they do with it afterwards? Eat it? Cassie couldn¡¯t remember.) A crisp mental snapshot of him listening to her while stroking a skunk. The illustrated incident with the tether ball. Running back inside the house with a perfectly heart-shaped blackberry leaf the size of a dinner plate, screaming, ¡°Look what he grew for me, Daddy!¡±


    Perhaps it wasn¡¯t so strange that her parents thought he was imaginary after all.


    Cassie emerged from her reverie to discover the afternoon was waning and her bucket was full. So was Mom¡¯s, and the job wasn¡¯t even halfway done yet. Her muscles felt wrung out in ways that did not bode well for tomorrow. They lugged the buckets back to the house and Mom bribed Matt to haul the bramble trimmings out front for compost pickup with promises of forthcoming pie. Cassie took the thorn circlet off in her room and hung it over the corner of her headboard before rinsing off and heading back downstairs.


    Mom dug a pie pan out of the clattering avalanche of bakeware in the lower cabinets while Cassie started washing blackberries. They probably had enough for three or four pies here. She hoped they¡¯d eaten a sufficient volume of funeral leftovers to store whatever they couldn¡¯t fit into the pie. Matt returned from sorting the trimmings just as Tyler¡¯s car pulled into the driveway; Cassie could hear him rev his engine once before cutting it. He must be in a good mood. She busied herself with making the pie so she wouldn¡¯t have to talk to him.


    Tyler slammed the front door open. ¡°Guess what!¡± he yelled by way of greeting, and slammed the door shut again.


    ¡°In the kitchen!¡± Mom called.


    Cassie started weaving a latticework cover for the pie.


    ¡°Guess what?¡± Tyler repeated, at the same volume, once he was in the kitchen.


    ¡°Chicken butt,¡± Cassie muttered.


    Tyler ignored her. ¡°Linda said she¡¯d cover the cost for the surveyor!¡±


    ¡°What surveyor?¡± Mom asked absently, checking on the casserole in the oven.


    If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.


    Tyler sighed and thumped into a chair. ¡°Mom, we talked about this.¡±


    ¡°Well, honey,¡± she replied, closing the oven door again and taking off her mitts at a deliberate pace, ¡°I¡¯ve had a lot of things on my mind.¡± Tyler actually looked chagrined for a moment before scowling and fiddling with a salt shaker.


    ¡°Who¡¯s Linda?¡± asked Matt.


    ¡°The real estate agent. She came by yesterday for an assessment.¡±


    The latticework top was somehow done already. Cassie started crafting a dough braid for the circumference.


    ¡°Is the property line in question?¡± Matt sat down next to Tyler, in the same seats habitually occupied since childhood.


    ¡°Not especially. She just wants to check the rear boundary; apparently the original development was pretty cavalier about marking off the parkland.¡±


    Mom sat down in her spot at the kitchen table and struck up a conversation about something else. Cassie finished the braid and looked up. There were only two empty seats at the table now, and they were next to each other. She stood for a moment, letting the sounds of dinner conversation wash over her, and then turned back to the counter. There was just enough dough left to fashion a little blackberry leaf shape. That would look nice.


    Cassie finally forced herself into her seat when the casserole was at the table.


    ¡°It¡¯s not the same, is it?¡± Tyler asked suddenly. Cassie looked up in surprise to see his eyes awash with tears. He rubbed them away. ¡°Without Dad here.¡±


    Mom reached across the table and took his hand.


    ¡°That¡¯s why,¡± he continued, throat harsh with the tears he had swallowed. ¡°I know it seems fast, to sell the house now. But it doesn¡¯t matter. Dad¡¯s not here.¡±


    ¡°Mom¡¯s still here,¡± Cassie said, nettled.


    Mom put her other hand on Cassie¡¯s arm placatingly. ¡°I am here,¡± she agreed, ¡°but Tyler is right. It¡¯s not the same without your dad. And I¡¯m not sure I want to be here without him, either. Not forever.¡±


    Cassie slumped in her seat. ¡°Tyler,¡± she asked¡ªpleaded¡ª ¡°why don¡¯t you move your family in?¡± Was she really begging Tyler to take over the house? She was. ¡°It doesn¡¯t need to be sold¡­¡±


    He shook his head, uncharacteristically morose. ¡°It¡¯s not big enough.¡±


    ¡°The difference between three and four kids isn¡¯t that big, we did well enough¡ª¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s twins, Cass.¡±


    ¡°Oh.¡± Cassie sat woodenly. ¡°Congratulations?¡±


    Fortunately, Mom and Matt both drowned out her stilted reply with significantly more genuine exclamations. Cassie ate her casserole in silence, feeling like the Grinch. When the little stovetop timer dinged tinnily to let her know the pie was done, she leapt for it like a life preserver, nearly knocking her chair over.


    ¡°Cassie,¡± Matt said reverently, as she levered the pie carefully out of the oven, ¡°that looks like it could be in a magazine.¡±


    Cassie had to admit it was an unusually photogenic pie, which Mom did in fact immediately insist on photographing to send to her church friends. Miraculously, the latticework had stayed intact, and the braid and decorative leaf shape were toasted gold. The blackberry filling bubbled darkly beneath, shifting the latticework as it settled. Cassie felt momentarily dizzy again. She needed to take care to drink more water next time she worked in the sun all day.


    They waited impatiently for the pie to cool, Matt and Tyler making themselves useful with kitchen cleaning for once while Mom hunted for vanilla ice cream in the blockaded freezer and Cassie dashed upstairs to send her proposal section, verifying it was free of FUCKs. She made it back downstairs just as Mom was serving the pie. Matt and Tyler loaded theirs up with ice cream and demolished them, pausing occasionally for an enthusiastic remark, and then helped themselves to seconds. Mom ate hers with more restraint, but otherwise seemed equally appreciative.


    Cassie, however, was having trouble.


    She¡¯d started as one ordinarily does with a pie: at the tip. It hadn¡¯t quite set yet¡ªpie impatience¡ªso the blackberry filling seeped across the plate, but that wasn¡¯t the problem. The problem was that as soon as she¡¯d put the bite into her mouth, a pleasure beyond taste lanced through her core, momentarily tunneling her vision. Her fork jangled to the floor.


    ¡°You okay, Cassie?¡±


    Cassie nodded and shakily retrieved her fork. She didn¡¯t trust herself to take another bite. She simply stared at the pie and tried to calm her pounding heart. Her mother and brothers continued eating their pie, oblivious to Cassie¡¯s flushed face and labored breathing.


    ¡°I¡¯m wiped,¡± she heard herself say, as though across a great distance of time and space. ¡°I¡¯m going to call it a night.¡± Plate and fork in hand, she acknowledged the full-mouthed goodnights with an indistinct murmur of her own and floated to her room.


    Cassie clicked on the creaky old goose-neck desk lamp, set the pie in its pool of light, and collapsed onto a chair, finally clear of clutter per the latest round of cleaning. Other than the elegant crust-work, now beginning to soften and crumble, it was an entirely unremarkable slice of pie with one bite eaten out of it.


    Maybe she was losing her mind after all.


    She grasped the fork resolutely and took a second bite.


    Again a thrill of pleasure rushed through her, threading from navel to groin. A soft noise escaped from her throat before she could stop herself. The room was still overwarm from the heat of the day. She leaned over and opened the window. It didn¡¯t help; the night was hot and still. Cassie felt herself begin to sweat. She should stop.


    She took another bite.


    Not a rush this time, but a dark and insistent pressure that settled inside and threatened to grow. She didn¡¯t wait for it to pass before taking the next bite and felt it build, tendrils of arousal spreading outward through her veins and rooting deeper with every mouthful. A bead of blackberry filling fell onto the desk; Cassie scooped it onto her finger and sucked it clean. The lamp flickered out, but she could still see the last few bites by the light of the moon. Her skin was covered in a silver sheen of perspiration. She was breathing raggedly, nearly panting, feeling the edges of the chair pressing against the back of her thighs so hard it almost hurt but she didn¡¯t care, she was almost done, only one piece left, she could barely bring the fork to her mouth through the tension, the last piece was in her mouth¡ª


    She convulsed silently, eyes closed, sticky fork fallen on the carpet as both hands grasped the edge of the desk. When the waves receded, she eased her grip and rested her head in her hands, too bewildered and sated to form lucid thought. A few crumbs spangled the plate. She licked her thumb and smeared them up, nibbling them off again in a daze. A breeze finally stirred her hair, and Cassie looked out the open window. The blackberry bush loomed, dark and puissant, and the world was still.


    Cassie wobbled to her feet, unable to think. She was so tired. She could think tomorrow, when her legs weren¡¯t trembling and her arms no longer weighed a thousand pounds. She stripped off her clothing and fell into bed¡ªthe thorn circlet rattled gently against the headboard¡ªand sank immediately into sleep.


    Her dreams were green.

 Chapter 6. You Draw Me All The Time

    The window was still open when she woke just after dawn. It was much cooler today; a damp film of condensation coated the desk, with a few tiny scuffmarks in the dew telling the tale of some early bird having enjoyed a crumb breakfast indoors.


    Cassie shivered and tried to sit up, but stopped with the first motion, sucking air in between her teeth. Every muscle protested yesterday¡¯s marathon trimming. She had to roll to her stomach and push herself out of bed with her hands before staggering over to close the window. Her shower this morning was hot and uncontested by any other water use, although the pipes still banged in protest, so Cassie stood and marinated for a long while. It gave her time to make a decision.


    It was a shame to fold the drawing Mom had so lovingly kept flat all these years, but Cassie didn¡¯t want to try bringing it through the bramble tunnel unprotected. Unless there was a folder or something¡­? She could probably find one.


    Cassie padded down the hallway to the office barefoot, jeans and t-shirt sticking to her slightly damp skin, and pushed open the door.


    Tyler jumped and stared at her like a deer in the headlights. He held a large yellow envelope in his hand.


    Cassie froze with a similar expression on her face. Then, in unison, they broke into scowls.


    ¡°What are you doing here?¡± Tyler hissed. For once, he was taking care to be quiet.


    ¡°Oh no you don¡¯t,¡± Cassie snarled back, also at a whisper. Mom was sleeping in the next room. ¡°Don¡¯t you dare pretend like I¡¯m the interloper here. You thought I¡¯d be in the shower long enough for you to do whatever it is you¡¯re doing.¡± Cassie stepped closer. Tyler held his ground. ¡°What are you doing here? What¡¯s that in your hand?¡±


    Tyler¡¯s hand spasmed, as though resisting the urge to clutch at the envelope. ¡°What¡¯s that in your hand?¡± he shot back.


    Cassie brandished the drawing in his face. ¡°A picture I drew that Mom and Dad saved.¡± She whipped it away again before he could get a good look and folded it roughly, then stuffed it in her back pocket. Oh well. ¡°Show me what you¡¯ve got.¡±


    Tyler drew himself up. ¡°It¡¯s private,¡± he said stiffly.


    ¡°Bullshit.¡± She lunged forward and snatched the envelope out of his hand. He started after it but then stopped himself, eyeing her warily. The envelope was already open; she fished out a dense stack of financial paperwork. Shit. There was no way she could parse this while she stood here, wired with suspicion and rage. ¡°What is this?¡±


    Tyler ripped it back out of her hands with a glint of triumph in his eyes and slid the papers back in, but before he could answer¡ªtruthfully or otherwise¡ªthe door pushed open wider.


    ¡°What are you two doing in here?¡± Mom stood in the door bundled in her fuzzy blue bathrobe and matching socks, deep lines of sleep still creased below her eyes. Tyler adopted an air of martyrdom and sighed, running his fingers through his hair. ¡°I was looking for information on the 529s Dad had started, like we talked about last night after Cassie went to bed. Is this it?¡± Looking directly at Cassie, he gave Mom the envelope. ¡°I didn¡¯t mean to wake you so early,¡± he added pointedly. Cassie felt her face going red.


    Mom cracked open the envelope and peered in muzzily. ¡°I don¡¯t have my glasses on,¡± she said, ¡°but this looks like it.¡± She handed it back. ¡°If it¡¯s not the right thing, just bring it back.¡±


    ¡°Thanks, Mom.¡± He brushed past Cassie, gave Mom a quick peck on the cheek, and strode out the door.


    ¡°You¡¯re not staying for breakfast?¡±


    ¡°Nope, sorry,¡± he called down the hallway, ¡°Just wanted to grab this before heading to work.¡± No longer attempting to be stealthy, Tyler thundered down the stairs.


    Cassie turned to Mom as Tyler slammed the front door. ¡°What¡¯s a ¡®529?¡¯¡±


    Mom rubbed her eyes. ¡°It¡¯s a college fund. Your dad wanted to start one for all his grandkids and seed it with a couple thousand dollars each. Tyler needs to get another one started for the second twin.¡±


    Cassie felt her flush deepen. She¡¯d probably been in the wrong here. And yet.


    ¡°Why was he being so sneaky about it, then? Isn¡¯t Matt supposed to be executor anyway?¡±


    Mom stopped rubbing her eyes and blinked owlishly. ¡°I think he was trying not to wake me, Cass. That having been said¡­¡± Mom rubbed her eyes again. God, how late did she stay up last night? Did Tyler keep her up? ¡°That having been said, I suspect he¡¯s embarrassed.¡±


    ¡°Embarrassed?¡±


    ¡°He doesn¡¯t know how he can afford five kids.¡±


    Cassie almost said something very mean, but managed to bite her tongue instead.


    ¡°When I sell the house¡ª¡± Mom started.


    ¡°When?¡± Cassie sat on the saggy old sleeper couch wearily. ¡°Not if?¡±


    Mom sat down next to her. ¡°Cass,¡± she said, equally weary, ¡°Dad and I talked about this before he passed. He wanted me to sell the house. Sell it, and do something good with the money.¡±


    ¡°Good?¡±


    ¡°Meaningful. Fun.¡±


    Cassie rubbed her face. ¡°What do you want, Mom?¡±


    ¡°I want to honor his memory. And I want my kids to be happy.¡±


    Cassie pulled her face out of her hands and turned to her mother. The ancient springs in the couch creaked like a cicada. ¡°Mom,¡± she said firmly. ¡°What would make you happy?¡±


    ¡°That would make me happy.¡±


    ¡°If Dad hadn¡¯t said anything about the house one way or the other, would you want to sell it?¡±


    Mom looked blank. ¡°I don¡¯t know. But it¡¯s not relevant.¡±


    Cassie gave up. Mom looked so tired. She leaned over and gave the soft cheek a kiss. ¡°I love you, Mom.¡± She rested her head on Mom¡¯s fuzzy shoulder. ¡°And I love this bathrobe.¡±


    Mom laughed and kissed the top of her head. ¡°Good thing I¡¯m wearing it, your hair¡¯s all wet still.¡±


    ¡°Oh! Sorry.¡± Cassie tied her wet hair back into a loose knot that immediately began to unravel.


    ¡°Will you help me with something today?¡±


    There was something else Cassie was supposed to do today, but she couldn¡¯t remember what it was any more. The Tyler encounter had completely driven it out of her head. ¡°Absolutely.¡±


    Mom smiled. ¡°Let¡¯s get rid of that treadmill.¡±


    ¡°Yes. Let¡¯s.¡±


    Neither of them could budge the treadmill, so Cassie settled for photographing it and posting it on Craigslist. They spent the rest of the day cleaning Cassie¡¯s old room, stretching out yesterday¡¯s abused muscles. Most of the mess wasn¡¯t Cassie¡¯s; her items had largely been cleared out over time, in stages. When she went away to college. When she moved out of the dorms and into an off-campus apartment. When she started her PhD. Things went into the trash bags and shredder, with a few odds and ends winding up in the Goodwill box. None of it was saved. By the evening, her room was completely clear except for her closet and that stupid treadmill.


    Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    Mom went downstairs to order a pizza¡ªthey had finally eaten the last of the casseroles¡ªand Cassie opened her closet. Given the depth of boxes that had been stacked against the door, and the smell of stale cedar potpourri that wafted out, it had probably been years since this closet was last opened. A few stickers blazed from the corner of the mirror mounted on the inside of the door, and a slinky fell on her head.


    She found her old sewing kit and put it in the Goodwill box (sorry, Mom). She found her old pillowcases and put them on the bed. She found her Illustrated Dictionary of Greek Myths, spine so exhausted by constant use that it had split somewhere in the H¡¯s. She found her prom dress: green, corset-backed, and bedazzled with a burst of rhinestones across the bust. Cassie put it on; it still fit.


    She laughed and flounced down the stairs to show it off. Mom laughed too¡ªit was so good to hear her laugh¡ªand went to scan and email Cassie¡¯s prom photos to her while they waited for the pizza. They ate in front of the TV in the den, Mom back in her bathrobe and Cassie still in her prom dress, petticoats rustling every time she reached for another slice.


    The closet was almost clear; just a basket of Beanie Babies and a large accordion portfolio on the floor. But it was late, and she¡¯d gotten up early. Cassie took off her prom dress with a whispered farewell, feeling a little silly, and folded it gently into the Goodwill box. She put on her pajamas, brushed her teeth, answered two work emails, dumped the Beanie Babies on her bed, and fell asleep looking up the prices of a little mottled crab on eBay.


    She couldn¡¯t remember what she dreamed, but she jerked upright and swung her feet out of bed before she was truly awake the next morning, knocking a bear and a bird to the floor with little beaded plops. She¡¯d forgotten something. It was important. She checked her phone¡ªno new emails. A blessed rarity. Cassie fumbled on her jeans with sleep-numbed hands and threw her shirt on backwards in her rush, but then stopped; she couldn¡¯t remember what she was rushing for. Cleaning? She looked at the closet. Cleaning shouldn¡¯t feel this urgent. It was just the accordion portfolio in there. But she couldn¡¯t remember what else it could be. So she lifted the portfolio to her desk, where it could be lit by the weak morning sun, and started pulling things out.


    There wasn¡¯t that much in there: two awkward geometric still lifes from art class, acrylic on canvas. An abstract watercolor study of some sort. A few charcoal nudes, both male and female, of significantly better quality. Mom had had a fit when she heard that live nude models would be making an appearance in a high school classroom, for Pete¡¯s sake, and almost didn¡¯t sign the permission slip. Dad had talked her into it.


    Deep in the last pocket of the portfolio was a stack of sketches, slightly warped by time and long-ago moisture exposure. Cassie pulled one out for a better look. This was a different set. Earlier, probably middle-school-era, and less refined, sketched from charcoal and pastel rather than pencil and watercolor. She¡¯d forgotten how good she used to be, even then. Unprotected in the pocket, the drawing had smeared against its neighbors, but the subject was still clearly identifiable: blackberry.


    ¡°Oh my god,¡± Cassie muttered aloud. That was what she was forgetting.


    She felt the judgment of technicolor jaguar stickers on the closet mirror staring at her with their enormous eyes. Her brain must be disintegrating, to forget something like that. Eaten away by grief. She almost leapt to her feet then and there to go charging into the bramble and demand answers, but something held her back. There was something in here she needed to know first. She pulled all the sketches out instead and laid them on the floor, one by one.


    Blackberry leaves. Blackberry flowers. Blackberry berries, whole and in cross-section (not a true berry: ¡°aggregate fruit¡±). Cane. Thorn. Root. Then: a hand. Long-fingered and sinewy, clearly belonging to an adolescent boy. Cassie felt the blood drain from her face as she set that sketch down. No wonder she¡¯d kept these quasi-hidden with the nudes; this looked like the artistic collection of a serial killer. She crossed the room and locked the door quietly before continuing. Another hand. An ear. An eye, bright green iris ringed and flecked with brown under heavy charcoal lashes. A foot, bare and buried in duff almost to the ankle, as though it had taken root there.


    Last of all, on a smaller piece of paper: a sketch of Cassie. Pubescent Cassie, looking up at something, eyes large, mouth thoughtful. It was superb, and clearly drawn by a different hand. She held this one rather than setting it on the floor. It was drawn in colored pencils¡ªpossibly the same set that drew the picture that now sat burning a hole in Cassie¡¯s back pocket. She had a vague recollection of deciding that colored pencils would hold up to the elements better than other media; she¡¯d left him the entire set, along with a pad of paper.


    He¡¯d wanted to learn to draw.


    ?


    ¡°I¡¯m going away now,¡± she¡¯d said. She was crouched in the bramble, holding a gallon-sized Ziploc bag filled with colored pencils and a fresh pad of paper.


    ¡°That sounds ominous,¡± the boy replied. He¡¯d just learned that word from a book last week and was clearly seeking a reason to use it in conversation.


    Cassie rolled her eyes and set the bag down. ¡°Only for three weeks.¡± She retrieved the scrunchie that had been dragged out of her hair by the blackberry passage and slid it onto her wrist. ¡°I¡¯m going to camp.¡±


    ¡°I remember,¡± the boy said. ¡°With the archery and the canoeing. And the s¡¯mores.¡± He mimed the act of roasting a marshmallow. Cassie had described it to him in vivid detail.


    ¡°You said you wanted to learn how to draw, so I brought you colored pencils and paper.¡± She handed them over and watched as he opened the bag carefully. ¡°The bag is to keep it dry and clean when you¡¯re not using any of the stuff.¡±


    ¡°Thank you.¡± He pulled out a green pencil and touched the tip curiously.


    ¡°It won¡¯t draw on your skin,¡± Cassie said helpfully. ¡°Only on paper.¡±


    ¡°Not like pens or markers.¡±


    ¡°No.¡± She watched as he pulled out the brown pencil and gave it the same treatment. ¡°What will you draw?¡±


    ¡°You.¡±


    Her face blazed. ¡°No,¡± she said. ¡°You can¡¯t.¡±


    The boy studied her thoughtfully, put the brown pencil back in the bag, and pulled out a pink one. ¡°Why not? You draw me all the time.¡±


    Her face was going to catch this entire bramble on fire. They would both die horrible burning deaths. It was probably for the best at this point. Him drawing her was different, somehow. She couldn¡¯t explain why. ¡°Because I won¡¯t be here to draw,¡± she said instead.


    ¡°That¡¯s okay. I¡¯ll remember.¡± He settled into the duff, crossing his gangly legs and leaning forward to put his chin in his hands and his elbows on his knees. Cassie held her breath as the birdsong stilled. The bower grew lighter. At first she thought it was simply the sun coming out from behind a cloud, but when she looked up she realized she could see the sky. She blinked in surprise. A neat hole had opened in the roof, illuminating Cassie in unfiltered sunlight. A thrill of delight warped by unease pulled her gaze back down. She couldn¡¯t see the boy any more after the brightness of the sun. All she could see through the afterimages was a labyrinth of thorny eigengrau and unblinking green eyes.


    Possessed by some madness, she leaned forward, hand outstretched, to touch the boy in the shadows. Her fingers brushed his neck, felt his pulse, slid up over his ear and into his hair, gently, slowly, so she wouldn¡¯t cut herself on any thorns. He didn¡¯t move. She still couldn¡¯t see him; her other hand touched his face, found his lips. His eyes closed. She kissed him.


    After that, it went all wrong.


    She fled the bramble without another word¡ªthat part wasn¡¯t so bad, she had to go anyway, what else was there to say¡ªbut then on the bus to the campgrounds all the girls played Hangman and MASH and when it was Cassie¡¯s turn to suggest a boy to marry, she said she didn¡¯t know. They said, you have to pick one. Have you ever kissed a boy? Pick him. And when Cassie said yes, it turned out she was the only girl among them who had kissed a boy for real, not like Spin the Bottle or Seven Minutes in Heaven, which Heather admitted was just a peck on the cheek because nobody could make them kiss on the lips if they didn¡¯t want to.


    And they wanted to know all about him. What was it like? When had they kissed? THIS MORNING? The MASH paper disappeared under Sarah¡¯s knees as she crowded in and the pencil rolled away under the seats, completely forgotten. Cassie was the center of attention of the entire bus now, boys and girls alike. If she thought she was going to catch on fire earlier, it was nothing compared to the spontaneous combustion she longed for now. She was almost weeping with mortification. A crying red tomato.


    She wouldn¡¯t tell them anything else. A few defended her. A few didn¡¯t believe her; that was what she wanted. Forced to confront the truth in the cruelest of unkind circumstances¡ªa busful of thirteen-year-olds¡ªeverything that was wrong with the situation boiled over her mind and into her throat, choking her. His autonomy, his behavior, his evident residence in a bush. The things that happened around him.


    His name.


    It was the first time Cassie considered the possibility that he might not, in fact, be real. She felt sick. She tried to say it was a joke; this made everyone decide it wasn¡¯t. The boys across the aisle hooted and called her Kissie Cassie. Meghan threw her water at them. The bus had to pull over.


    The campers eventually moved on to new topics of discussion, after the bus had to pull over again so that a reedy little boy could throw up halfway up the mountain, and Jessica got her period for the first time ever that night in one of the girl¡¯s cabins, staining a loud red blotch all the way down to the mattress. Cassie canoed, and wove friendship bracelets, and won second place in the archery contest. She ate at least one s¡¯more each night and precision-roasted marshmallows for other campers prone to losing theirs in the firepit. Kissie Cassie was forgotten by all except one boy who tried to kiss her on the last day of camp, right there by the mess hall milk machine.


    She dumped her Froot Loops on him.


    He called her a slut.


    When Cassie came home from camp, she didn¡¯t go to see the boy in the bramble. Not that day, and not the next. She didn¡¯t go to take her pencils or paper back. She didn¡¯t eat a single blackberry. When the portrait of her appeared on her desk one early morning, vibrant and incredible, after she¡¯d slept with the window open, she sleepily picked it up, put it in her portfolio, climbed back into bed, and decided she¡¯d dreamed it.


    She never saw him again.


    Until the day of her father¡¯s funeral.

 Chapter 7. Root and Vine

    Cassie could feel the square of her folded childhood drawing in her pocket as she sat to put on her socks and shoes, urging her on. Nobody else was awake. Watery morning light illuminated patches on the carpet and obscured the family photos cascading down the stairwell wall with mirror-bright reflection as she crept silently by. Through the kitchen, out the back door with only a faint click. She paused to look up at the house, but the blinds were drawn on all windows but her own. Nobody saw her as she crossed the yard and slipped into the bramble.


    Wouldn¡¯t it be funny, she thought¡ªscreamingly hilarious¡ªif he weren¡¯t there? It was a weekend, and the sun had only just risen. No sane person would be up at this hour, let alone picking his way through the bushes. The gate was already open wide enough for her to get through¡ªhow had he been getting through? It wasn¡¯t open wide enough for him, rangy though he may be. The question should have occurred to her earlier.


    A lot of things should have.


    She stepped through the gate.


    She didn¡¯t see him at first. The bramble was shadowed at this hour, and Cassie¡¯s eyes were still adjusting. Motion caught her eye; he was sitting further back, behind a spray of canes that had arced back down to the ground and rooted in the soil. Thin black sweater, dirty black jeans, bare feet that disappeared into the duff. He didn¡¯t speak.


    Cassie licked her lips and slid the picture out of her pocket, then unfolded it with a faintly trembling hand.


    ¡°I drew you,¡± she said, and held it out to him. ¡°A long time ago.¡±


    He examined the picture for a moment, hair falling in his face, then smiled. ¡°I remember this.¡±


    ¡°I labeled everyone¡¯s names.¡±


    ¡°Yes.¡±


    ¡°Except yours.¡±


    He looked up. He was slightly more clean-shaven today, but his hair was still an unruly thicket. ¡°Yes you did.¡± He turned the drawing around to face her again and pointed. ¡°Right here.¡± Cassie looked.


    Rubus armeniacus, her meticulously crafted childhood handwriting said. Blackberry.


    Cassie sat down. After a moment, he sat down before her. But then, he was already all around her, wasn¡¯t he?


    ¡°Rubus,¡± she whispered.


    He reached out and touched her¡ªnot on her neck, or her lips, as she had done so long ago to him, but on her cheek. Soft as a flower petal. When he drew his hand back, it was wet.


    ¡°Why are you crying?¡± Rubus asked.


    Cassie wilted to the ground and rolled onto her back, felt her tears start pooling in her ears before overflowing into the duff. A gentle breeze stirred the roof of the bower over their heads.


    ¡°I forgot you,¡± Cassie choked. ¡°For years. I thought I needed to forget you, because you couldn¡¯t be real. So I did.¡±


    Rubus reached down and scooped Cassie into his lap. For a second time, she cried in his arms. He said nothing at all, and held absolutely still, as though rooted to the ground. It was a real possibility.


    When she finally stopped crying enough to see, he was looking down at her solemnly. He pulled a strand of hair from her tear-sticky cheek and tucked it behind her ear. ¡°I¡¯m glad you remembered me,¡± he said, voice resonating in his chest. ¡°It¡¯s an honor to be remembered by a botanist.¡±


    Cassie took a ragged breath and smiled. ¡°It¡¯s an honor to be remembered by a dryad.¡±


    The kiss was sudden, and not gentle. Cassie gasped into his mouth, eyes flaring wide for a moment before closing again, squeezing out the last of the tears. Rubus brushed them away with his thumb as he wandered her face, kissing her jaw and nose, tracing the curve of her ear, resting his forehead against hers for a heartbeat before claiming her mouth again.


    When he moved to her neck, Cassie opened her eyes. The glossy leaves above her were trembling. More movement out of the corner of her eye; the canes were shifting, writhing. To what end, she couldn¡¯t see, for just at that moment Rubus worked his hand under her shirt, running his fingers over her stomach and ribs, and her eyes closed again of their own accord. He pulled her shirt off and lay her down in the duff.


    Cassie moved to unhook her bra, but his hand was already there, under her, and it was more than just his fingers; nascent seedlings, tender and thornless, were growing around her, caressing her skin with tender cotyledons. Her bra came undone. Rubus slid it off and his expression changed. The cotyledons stilled; the leaves stopped their shimmer. The dryad simply gazed at her, longingly, reverently, as he had years ago when he first prepared to draw her portrait.


    The breeze sighed in the leaves and Rubus leaned forward to touch her; the sweep of her collarbone, the curve of her flank. His eyes shone with fascination as much as arousal.


    This was all new to him, Cassie realized. Her flesh was not being caressed by some ancient entity who¡¯d walked the earth for eons, seducing mortals that happened across his path. He must be the spirit of this particular blackberry bramble, not the spirit of all blackberries as an aggregate concept. A hamadryad.


    God knows how he knew how to unhook a bra.


    His fingers drifted to her hips. She toed off her shoes and wriggled from her pants, eyes never leaving his face. How strange, to feel the cool outside air fresh against skin that spent most of its life under clothing¡ªand his hands followed, warm, gentle, smoothing from belly to thighs. Cassie arched, eyes fluttering shut, and he wrapped his arm around to her back to explore the run of her spine with his fingers, kissing her once more.


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    Cassie tried to surreptitiously peel her socks off, but he captured an ankle and completed the action for her, examining her toes.


    So she lay there, completely naked, trying not to laugh while Rubus traced the arch of her foot.


    ¡°What¡¯s so funny?¡± he asked, without rancor.


    ¡°That tickles,¡± Cassie snorted, unable to hold still any longer.


    He looked at her foot with renewed interest. ¡°Is that why you always wear socks and shoes?¡±


    ¡°No, shoes are usually for keeping our feet protected from things that can hurt them while we¡¯re walking, like hot asphalt or sharp rocks. The socks are to keep the shoes from chafing our skin.¡± How had this not come up before, during some childhood conversation? What other bizarre knowledge gaps did he have? ¡°You¡¯ve worn shoes before, I¡¯ve seen it.¡±


    ¡°It seemed important,¡± he said mildly, and ran a finger down her foot again. Cassie squeaked and tried to roll over, but his hold on her ankle was absolute. She may as well have had her foot stuck in a tree.


    ¡°Do you like this?¡± he asked, pausing.


    Cassie wasn¡¯t sure she could explain the concept of tickling to a plant under ordinary circumstances, let alone what she found herself in the middle of now. ¡°I¡ªyes. I like being touched by you. Yes.¡±


    The canes began to shift in her peripheral vision again as Rubus ceased his tickling and resumed his caress. Over her heel, up her calf, around her knee to her thigh. His eyes grew bright and the air became still as he neared where she so desperately wanted him to be. ¡°Yes,¡± Cassie whispered. She closed her eyes. ¡°Yes.¡±


    Those long fingers, slow and warm. She could see them, in her mind¡¯s eye, as she had drawn them countless times. She wouldn¡¯t last long. Kissie Cassie. Her hands dug into the duff, through it into the soil below. Roots reached up and twined around her knuckles, holding her fast. Yes. She was gasping, voice catching with each breath, and Rubus responded by gathering a fistful of hair from the nape of her neck, never stopping with his other hand, and pulling her into a kiss through which she could not breathe. She whimpered into his mouth. Yes. Yes.


    He pinned her with the kiss while she shuddered, and the rootlets kept her in their grasp.


    Not until she relaxed completely did Rubus relinquish his hold on Cassie, mouth retreating from hers and fingers untwining from her hair, and she sighed¡ªto get air as much as anything. She opened her eyes. He was looking at his glistening fingers, enthralled. A strand of clear, viscous moisture dropped to the ground. When it touched the soil where they had collaboratively mussed the duff away, his lips parted, as though he could taste it. Then he did taste it, bringing his fingers to his tongue almost instinctively, the way Cassie had licked the pie filling from her desk. She wondered if she tasted as good to him as he had to her.


    She wondered a lot of things.


    Cassie sat up and kissed him, tasting herself, and the dryad leaned into the kiss. She reached to take his shirt off, but her hand met only bare flesh. She pulled back in confusion; his sweater was simply gone. Demanifested. So were his pants, and whatever he may have been wearing beneath. He was as naked as she. Now it was her turn to look, and to touch.


    Mom would have said he had a ¡°Mediterranean complexion¡±¡ªand Cassie would have crawled into a hole to die of embarrassment if she had¡ªbut it was more than that. Much more; he was changing now, slowly, subtly. The green tint to his flesh was more than just light filtered through leaves, more than just olive-toned skin. Cassie brushed her fingers through the dark hairs dusting his chest¡ªpilose indumentum, plant fur, soft as velvet. The sinews strung beneath his chlorophyllic skin arched like primocane, almost rigid to the touch, veins like rhizomes twining about them. Just like the picture that now lay abandoned with her clothes, the hair on Rubus¡¯ head was thick with thorns. Cassie touched one softly, admiring its point, before turning her attentions lower.


    More indumentum, a trail of it leading to a dark thatch. No thorns, just iridescent blackness. She glanced at him for permission, hands drifting downward. His eyes were eager and bright.


    Cassie knelt down to explore him with a botanist¡¯s curiosity.


    Rubus shifted abruptly, startling her. She looked up again, hands stilled upon him. He was watching her. ¡°That feels¡­¡± He stopped, unable to find the words.


    Cassie smiled. ¡°Wait,¡± she said softly, and tasted him. Floral and faintly sweet, mixed with a bitter green tang. Sap and pollen. She swallowed, and Rubus shuddered.


    Driven by some instinct, he put his hands on the back of her head and pulled her closer, deeper, but just as quickly his hands drew away, as if he were afraid to hurt her. She smiled, and moved lightly, hands wrapped around his thighs, feeling the tension in them, tracing features with her tongue, until she felt him relax.


    He leaned back into the throne of thorns that had grown to meet his frame and tilted his face towards the canopy of leaves, eyes closed, ribs sliding beneath his skin with each breath.


    She took him deeper and hummed softly, sliding her hands around his hips. He buried his hands in her hair and groaned, and the noise was echoed by the creaking of the bramble as it shifted and knotted itself around her. She felt the serrated brush of blackberry leaves at her back, urging her closer, and rootlets binding her bare legs to the ground. The bower began to grow dark. The smell of fertile earth filled her nose.


    Cassie could no longer tell whether she clasped flesh or bark. She did not stop; tongue and lips and mouth around him, arms upon his thighs, knees held fast beneath a web of roots, gliding up and down again and again as the air grew still and murky. Thorns combed her hair away from her face. The only light was a dim, subterranean green, with no discernible source. The creature she held was rigid and silent, brimming with pressure barely contained.


    With one last, deliberate set of actions¡ªa hand moved, a pace quickened¡ªCassie pulled him over the edge. Vines tangled her hair into a braided snarl as sap flooded her throat, pulse after pulse. Cassie watched him as she swallowed, his face twisted with euphoria. If he made any sound as he climaxed, it was drowned by the creaking of the wood and thrash of leaves in the sudden wind, or else the rush of blood in her ears.


    The bower grew lighter again as the roof of leaves thinned, trembling as they shifted, illuminating a face that looked shocked and blissful in equal measure. Root and vine withdrew from Cassie¡¯s kneeling form, tugging gently at her hair and tickling her skin with their retreat. Freed from her pinions, Cassie released Rubus from her mouth and arched back, stretching her spine and rolling her neck. He watched her motions with gleaming eyes, breathing hard.


    Her throat ached pleasantly, and there was a warm sensation in her stomach. Cassie leaned back down to lap up the last of the sap still flowing, and was gratified by a hiss of air through his teeth. She smiled in satisfaction and kissed the inside of his thigh.


    Rubus lifted her into his lap and pulled her into a tight embrace, resting his forehead on her chest. The thorns were gone from his hair now; she stroked it gingerly as the birds began to flutter through the bramble once more.


    ¡°Is it always like this?¡± he asked. His breath was warm on her skin.


    ¡°Like what?¡±


    ¡°So good. So much.¡±


    Cassie smiled. ¡°It can be.¡±


    ¡°Mmm,¡± he mumbled happily, and placed a kiss between her breasts. His fingers trailed along the muscles in her back.


    Cassie stretched like a climbing vine.

 Chapter 8. H is for Hamadryad

    ¡°I kept the picture you drew of me,¡± Cassie said, resting her cheek on the top of his head. But for her voice, and the noises of birds, the bower was still quiet. ¡°From before I went to camp. You told me you wanted to learn to draw, but you already knew.¡±


    Rubus lifted his head to look her in the eyes very seriously. ¡°I didn¡¯t.¡± He traced her eyebrow lightly with his finger. ¡°I drew you over and over until it was right. That¡¯s why it took me so long. I used up all the paper. I still have the pencils, though.¡±


    Cane undulated behind him, and a moment later he reached back and plucked a dirt-caked Ziploc bag from the bramble. Cassie peeled it open; the colored pencils, unfaded but notably shortened as a result of crude, rough-hewn sharpening, tinkled together at the bottom of the bag. She stared at them, momentarily lost for words. ¡°I can get you more paper, if you¡¯d like,¡± she finally managed, handing it back.


    ¡°Yes please,¡± he replied earnestly. ¡°And do you have any new books?¡±


    ¡°Would botany magazines interest you?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know. May I read one to find out?¡±


    ¡°Absolutely.¡± Cassie ran her fingers over his hair again, thornless but still too snarled to comb. ¡°Can¡ªdo you mind if I ask you some questions?¡±


    ¡°No. I like your questions.¡±


    There were too many, so she just asked the one immediately at hand, in the most literal sense. ¡°Where did your thorns go? The ones in your hair?¡±


    ¡°They¡¯re still there,¡± he said comfortably, ¡°you just can¡¯t see them right now.¡±


    Cassie felt the gears of scientific inquiry grinding uselessly in her mind and switched her tack. ¡°Do all blackberry bushes have dryads?¡±


    ¡°No,¡± he replied immediately.


    ¡°Are you the only blackberry dryad?¡±


    Rubus stroked her collarbone as he thought. ¡°I don¡¯t know,¡± he said slowly. ¡°I¡¯ve never met another one.¡±


    ¡°Have you ever met another dryad? Of any type?¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡± Rubus¡¯ eyes lit up. ¡°One time, a tumbleweed blew through the parkland.¡±


    ¡°A tumbleweed!¡± (Kali tragus.) ¡°Way out here?¡±


    ¡°Yes. He was very determined to adventure. He didn¡¯t stay long, but he had a lot of interesting stories. He fought a snowplow once, and punched a bull in the throat. And he almost died after a truck hit him on the highway and dragged him along underneath for three miles.¡±


    ¡°Tumbleweeds are already dead by the time they¡¯re tumbling,¡± Cassie blurted before she could stop herself. Rubus remained unperturbed. ¡°Well, he had scars all along his face and a missing tooth, but it didn¡¯t seem to bother him; he was always grinning. Laughed a lot, too. He sounded like a creaky screen door spring.¡± Rubus smiled. ¡°He told me he liked my thorns.¡±


    ¡°Was he the only other dryad you¡¯ve met?¡±


    ¡°No. A very kind old ficus lived in an enameled pot on a deck two houses down, before her family moved away. They brought her inside every winter, but when she was out we would sometimes talk.¡±


    ¡°What did you talk about?¡±


    ¡°Oh, all sorts of things. The weather, of course. Water quality. She was very curious about the ground¡ªher roots were all inside the pot¡ªand I had birds bring her an earthworm for her potting soil every so often. We shared ladybugs sometimes. She would ask me about the books I¡¯d read and I would ask her about the television shows she¡¯d seen while she was inside.¡±


    ¡°She watched TV?¡±


    ¡°Yes. She said most of it was boring, or sad. I think she watched a lot of news. She liked Jeopardy though.¡±


    Cassie was too taken aback to even laugh.


    ¡°Sometimes,¡± Rubus continued, ¡°the husband fell asleep while watching television after the wife had already gone to bed, and old black-and-white movies would play all night. That was her favorite. She would actually step out to watch those.¡±


    ¡°Step out?¡± Cassie realized what he must mean a split second after she spoke. ¡°From her tree?¡±


    ¡°Yes. She hid behind a grandfather clock, she said.¡±


    ¡°She never¡­¡± Cassie searched for the words. ¡°... interacted with the humans in the house? They didn¡¯t know she was there?¡±


    ¡°No.¡± Rubus¡¯ eyes grew vague. ¡°She thought I was very foolish to do so myself.¡±


    Cassie watched a caterpillar inch its way along a cane behind Rubus¡¯ head. ¡°It does seem potentially very risky,¡± she allowed. ¡°Am I the only human you¡¯ve spoken to?¡±


    ¡°No,¡± Rubus said, very quietly. ¡°When we were very little, I used to play with Matt, too.¡±


    ¡°Why did you stop?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know.¡± Rubus¡¯ voice became even quieter. ¡°It seemed like he didn¡¯t want to play with me anymore, and I didn¡¯t know why.¡± Cassie could hear the betrayal. Perhaps a dryad¡¯s memory was more powerful, more perfectly recalled, than that of a human. Or perhaps he just had little else to occupy his mind over the years.


    ¡°Did the tumbleweed interact with people?¡±


    Rubus perked up again. ¡°Yes. Dozens. He never told them what he was, and never stuck around long enough for them to find out, but he said he fucked fifty-seven lady ranchers, three diner busboys, and a lonely drifter in a desert laundromat.¡± Rubus said this so matter-of-factly, it took several moments for Cassie to fully process what he¡¯d just said. Really, that was more or less the behavior she¡¯d expect from a sentient tumbleweed. Before she could reply, he added, a little uncertainly, ¡°He said he always kept his hat and boots on while fucking. But you took all your clothes off, so I did too.¡±


    ¡°No¡ª¡± Cassie scrambled to catch up with the conversation, ¡°no, that was definitely the right thing to do. Thank you.¡± She touched his bare shoulder. ¡°Do you get cold without clothing on?¡±


    ¡°Not in the summer. In the winter, sometimes, when there¡¯s frost.¡±


    Cassie ran her fingers through his chest hair again. It felt more mammalian now. ¡°You wore a suit to my father¡¯s funeral,¡± she said idly.


    ¡°All the men were wearing suits at your father¡¯s funeral.¡± His eyes were half closed, enjoying her touch. ¡°It must be hard to always keep so much clothing around for when you need it.¡±


    Cassie considered this, still stroking his chest. ¡°We do have to dedicate a fair amount of storage to it,¡± she agreed. ¡°Bureaus and closets and shoe-racks.¡± She thought of her prom dress. ¡°Sometimes, we even buy clothing we only wear once, for a very special occasion. Usually women.¡±


    ¡°Why?¡±


    Cassie did not speak for a whole minute while she mentally composed her response. Rubus didn¡¯t press her; he merely waited in contented silence, eyes heavy-lidded with pleasure as she trickled her nails across his skin.


    ¡°Because for a long time,¡± she said slowly, ¡°women were told they have to be beautiful, and men have to be utilitarian. This is less true now than it used to be, but women are still expected to be more beautiful than men. This can be very frustrating for women who are not interested in being beautiful and men who are.¡±


    Rubus opened his eyes fully and stilled her hand. ¡°You¡¯re not interested in being beautiful?¡±


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    ¡°It¡¯s¡­ not particularly relevant to my life¡­¡± She¡¯d used up all her eloquence. ¡°I mean, of course nobody wants to be ugly, with a few exceptions, I suppose. It can be really hard to be taken seriously in academia if you¡¯re too pretty or too ugly, for women at least, so we normally aim for something middle of the road¡­ I mean¡­ Yeah, I¡¯ll gussy myself up for a special occasion. I like looking nice now and then, but I¡¯m not sure that really constitutes an ¡®interest¡¯ per se¡­¡±


    Rubus let her stammer to a halt before taking her other hand. ¡°You are beautiful,¡± he said simply. The statement was delivered with the same matter-of-fact sincerity with which he recalled the sexual escapades of the tumbleweed. Cassie went crimson, but fortunately was spared from having to muster a response when he smiled and patted both her cheeks. ¡°I like your colors,¡± he said, and kissed her delicately.


    There was a faint noise from the house: the coffee grinder. Cassie looked up in amazement. Surely they hadn¡¯t been in here that long! But the angle of the sun through the leaves clearly indicated midmorning. She dismounted from Rubus¡¯ lap and started hurriedly throwing on her clothes. He watched the process with as much interest as he¡¯d earlier observed it in reverse.


    ¡°Mom wants to finish trimming today,¡± Cassie said, struggling to comb her fingers through her hair. ¡°We only got halfway done the other day.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s fine,¡± Rubus said magnanimously.


    ¡°It doesn¡¯t hurt when we do that?¡± Cassie gave up combing her hair and scraped it into a pile.


    ¡°Not in a bad way, as long as you don¡¯t cut too much.¡±


    ¡°We¡¯ll be careful,¡± she promised. ¡°And the berries¡ª¡± Cassie cut herself off.


    For once, Rubus didn¡¯t look wholly innocent when he smiled. ¡°You liked them?¡±


    ¡°You could say that.¡± Cassie sat down to put on her socks. ¡°How did you¡­ target that effect?¡±


    ¡°What do you mean?¡±


    ¡°Mom and Matt and Tyler didn¡¯t have nearly the experience I did.¡±


    ¡°I grew the berries for you.¡±


    ¡°I have so many questions about this.¡± Cassie slipped on her shoes and stood. ¡°The pharmaceutical implications are staggering.¡±


    Rubus stood with her, miraculously clothed once again. His hair brushed the bower canopy. ¡°If you come back, I will answer your questions. If I can.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll come back tonight, if I can get away without being seen. I¡¯ll bring you more paper. And a magazine.¡±


    ¡°Thank you.¡±


    Cassie stood on tiptoes to place a quick kiss on his jaw and, with one last futile pat to her hair, slipped out of the bramble.


    Nobody was looking out of the kitchen as she emerged, but both Matt and Mom looked up in surprise when she slid open the door and stepped inside.


    ¡°Couldn¡¯t find my gloves,¡± Cassie announced overloudly.


    Mom looked back down at the coffee pot as she poured. ¡°They¡¯re on the counter right next to the toaster, Cassie.¡±


    ¡°Oh. Thanks.¡±


    Matt watched Cassie over his own coffee mug and then took a long, contemplative sip.


    Cassie felt a blush beginning and fled to her room before it could betray her further. She spent a long time combing her hair, and afterwards she just sat on her bed, comb in her hand, looking out the window and smiling.


    When she finally came back downstairs, Matt was hunched over the kitchen table tapping a pencil on his head absently, documents arrayed around him in a neat semicircle. Mom sat across from him, sipping coffee and looking baffled. ¡°What¡¯s all this?¡± Cassie asked, taking her regular seat. There was already a muffin and a cup of coffee waiting there for her; Mom must have poured it when she heard Cassie coming down the stairs.


    ¡°A few things,¡± Matt said, straightening up. He started spinning the pencil across his fingers. ¡°I¡¯m making a couple tweaks to the trust. Trusts, plural, technically.¡±


    Cassie felt her brain prepare to take a vacation, but forced it back to attention. ¡°Does this have anything to do with Tyler¡¯s 529s?¡±


    Matt fumbled his pencil in surprise. ¡°Partially. Since when do you know about 529s?¡±


    ¡°Since Tyler made off with a sheaf of 529 paperwork from the office yesterday morning.¡±


    Matt frowned. ¡°Odd,¡± he muttered, then turned to lift one of the paper stacks at his elbow. ¡°I thought¡ª¡±


    His thought was interrupted by the doorbell. Matt and Cassie looked at Mom, who looked just as surprised as they. Cassie went to answer.


    She opened the door to two orange-vested men in straw hats and sunglasses. The man in front was holding a clipboard; the man in back was resting a theodolite against the wall while he applied sunscreen to his nose. ¡°You must be the surveyors,¡± she said hollowly, before either of them could speak. Apparently they were available even on weekends.


    ¡°Ah, yes ma¡¯am,¡± said the clipboard-man, folding away his sunglasses. ¡°Are you the owner of this property?¡±


    ¡°No, that would be my mother. Hold on one moment, I¡¯ll go get her.¡± Leaving the door open, she walked to within earshot of the kitchen and yelled, ¡°Mom, the surveyors are here!¡±


    ¡°Coming!¡±


    As soon as Mom came to the door, Cassie shot straight back through the kitchen, grabbed her gardening gloves, and ran into the backyard. ¡°I¡¯ll open the side gate for the surveyors, Mom!¡± she bellowed, and proceeded to do so with as much banging and corroded-bell-tinkling as she could manage. She waited breathlessly for them to come around¡ªit seemed to take them an eternity¡ªand dogged their steps as closely as she could without getting clipped by a theodolite. Mom watched from the porch, shading her eyes.


    ¡°You ladies don¡¯t need to stand out in the sun while we work,¡± the clipboard-man hinted, ¡°this¡¯ll take a while.¡± Cassie wordlessly turned away, put on her gloves, and started weeding around the base of the peach tree, never letting the surveyors out of her sight. She answered a string of three work emails right there, kneeling on the tree roots, one eye on the message she was tapping and the other on the surveyors as they worked. Mom went to get them some water.


    ¡°Is there a way through the back fence?¡± the other asked after a time of mysterious measurements and pacing.


    ¡°No,¡± replied Cassie firmly. ¡°You¡¯ll have to go around, through the park. The entrance is just down the street.¡±


    ¡°Oh well, that¡¯s how it goes,¡± he replied cheerfully. He hoisted his theodolite to his shoulder and ambled back out the side gate, whistling. Cassie could hear him rustling and calling to his partner from the other side of the fence a short while later. She held her breath and felt her heart leap with every rustle.


    When they finally finished, they came back around and rang the doorbell again. Cassie and Matt both joined their mother at the door.


    ¡°Good news, ma¡¯am! You¡¯ve got another¡ª¡± the surveyor checked his clipboard¡ª ¡°six hundred and fifty square feet of property on the other side of your fence back there!¡±


    ¡°Oh!¡± exclaimed Mom.


    ¡°Nice,¡± said Matt.


    Cassie said nothing. A pit of vague unease opened in her stomach. She drifted back to the kitchen and sat down, careful not to disturb any of the documents, then picked up her mug and took a sip of tepid coffee. Matt joined her a moment later while Mom was still talking to the surveyors. He sat down and didn¡¯t speak for a moment, then pulled something out of his pocket.


    ¡°You dropped this,¡± he said simply, and handed Cassie the childhood drawing she had stuffed in her pocket.


    She had thrown her clothes on in such haste, she wasn¡¯t surprised it had fallen out. Stupid not to have checked. She took it from him and turned her face away. ¡°Thank you,¡± she said belatedly after a moment of silence. She waited for him to say something else, but he seemed to be waiting for her to offer an explanation. She didn¡¯t. He resumed shuffling the papers. Cassie looked out the kitchen door and thought of Rubus. She hoped the surveyors hadn¡¯t alarmed him too much.


    ¡°Are you going to need to print out a bunch more stuff?¡± she asked after a while.


    ¡°God, I hope not. If anything, I¡¯d like to scan all this and e-sign rather than dead-tree it.¡±


    Cassie turned around and watched Matt underline something. ¡°Thank you.¡±


    He looked up. ¡°For what?¡±


    ¡°For doing all this for Mom. For being the executor.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯d be a pretty crummy lawyer-son if I didn¡¯t.¡±


    Cassie smiled. ¡°Thank you anyway.¡±


    ¡°De nada.¡±


    ¡°Glad we didn¡¯t fight over it.¡±


    Matt hesitated. ¡°We didn¡¯t,¡± he agreed, ¡°but Tyler and I had a tug-of-war over the executorship for a bit. Before Dad died. It was actually Dad snapping and yelling at Tyler that put an end to it.¡±


    Cassie sat rigid with confusion and rage. ¡°But¡ªwhy?¡± Tyler made Dad yell at him? While he was dying? My god, how much of a shitheel did you have to be to get to that level? ¡°He wouldn¡¯t know any more about this kind of thing than I would, and he¡¯s got a million kids to boot!¡±


    Matt sighed. ¡°It didn¡¯t make any sense to me, either. Maybe some sort of firstborn-son thing?¡±


    Cassie made a rude noise.


    ¡°Yeah, well.¡± Matt turned back to the paper he held. ¡°Nobody¡¯s at their best with a dying parent, are they?¡±


    Cassie shook her head and plodded up to the office. Mom kept the printer in the closet, so infrequently was it used. She opened the door and peered into the printer tray. She¡¯d make a run to the store for a pad of drawing paper tomorrow, but for now this was the only paper available in the house. There wasn¡¯t much. She took all but the last two sheets of paper and closed the tray again, then looked out the window. The surveyors must have gone again; Mom was standing on the deck pulling on her gloves. The paper would have to wait. She put it away in her room and joined her mother outside to complete trimming the blackberry.


    The endeavor took on a completely different tone now that she knew what she was doing¡ªto whom it was being done. What did this feel like¡ªa haircut? A deep, exfoliating scrub? She didn¡¯t dare eat a blackberry, alluring as they were; they all went into the bucket. Snip snip, plop plop.


    She was a little surprised to discover how calmly she was assimilating proof of the supernatural. Perhaps all those years in Sunday school had left more of a mark than she¡¯d realized, in a pantheon-insensitive way. Perhaps she was just in shock. Perhaps there was some question among the ever-increasing pile accruing at the back of her mind whose answer would set her off and she¡¯d run screaming from the thicket.


    Perhaps it was just that she had always known, and merely forgotten.

 Chapter 9. Beans

    Over the course of the afternoon, Cassie and her mother freed the rose trellises, untangled the sundial, and rescued the garden gnome, who was then re-homed on the deck. The avocado saplings were nowhere to be found. At last, as the shadows began to lengthen, they sat down on the cleared swingset and admired their handiwork. Rust flakes sprinkled down occasionally as they kicked themselves to and fro. Nobody was going to win a topiary competition, but the bush had at least been planed back to an even six-foot standoff from the fence. There was no tunnel to be seen.


    Cassie twisted the swing around to survey the rest of the yard. It looked a little bare, but neat. Ready.


    ¡°What do you want to plant next?¡± she asked.


    Mom heaved herself out of the swing with a grunt and turned to look as well. She looked for a long time in silence. ¡°I don¡¯t know,¡± she said finally. Then she sighed. ¡°Whatever Linda recommends to make the house look good, probably. Something cheap.¡±


    Cassie let the swing untwist around again and stared blankly at the blackberry bush. Her phone buzzed. She ignored it until it buzzed again; they had a taker for the treadmill. Spirits lifted somewhat, they went inside. Matt arrived in time to help huff and puff the treadmill down the stairs with the Craigslist buyer¡ªMom stood peering up through the banister, repeating that she couldn¡¯t remember how they got it up there in the first place¡ªand load it into his pickup. They used the cash to order food and leave a big tip, and ate in front of the television in the den. There was a Twilight Zone marathon running. Cassie found herself wondering if the ficus had ever seen it.


    She had promised to help her mom start looking for apartments that evening, and Matt had decided to stay the night and work remotely tomorrow, but she managed to dash outside with the printer paper and a botany magazine while both her mother and brother were simultaneously occupied in the bathrooms.


    The tunnel in the bramble had returned, clear as a cartoon mousehole in the light of the moon.


    Cassie slid the paper and magazine inside and ran back just as the toilets flushed. She pretended she had been getting dessert ready for them. Didn¡¯t Cassie want some blackberry pie too?


    She demurred.


    The three of them huddled around Matt¡¯s laptop on the kitchen table afterwards, looking for apartments for Mom. What neighborhood was she looking at? She didn¡¯t know. What price range? She wasn¡¯t sure. What amenities did she care about? Oh she had no preference, it didn¡¯t matter really. Matt and Cassie prompted her with suggestions: somewhere walkable to church and the library? Something with a garden? She agreed immediately to everything they mentioned; it was impossible to determine whether she was genuinely pleased with the proposals, or just relieved to abdicate the decision-making. Cassie and Matt exchanged a look over their mother¡¯s head while she dithered over a floor-plan comparison.


    ¡°We don¡¯t have to decide tonight,¡± Matt said, patting Mom¡¯s back and easing the laptop away.


    ¡°Sleep on it,¡± Cassie urged. ¡°Think about what you¡¯d like. We can talk more tomorrow.¡±


    ¡°Yes,¡± Mom agreed. ¡°Yes, that sounds good.¡± She gave them both a peck on the cheek and went upstairs, leaving Cassie and Matt in the kitchen. Matt foraged for a slice of pie and sat back down at the table, then began idly clicking around on his laptop. Cassie gazed sightlessly into the night. Was the paper still waiting in the tunnel, or was Rubus drawing already? Should she have given him a clipboard or a book or something harder than a magazine as a drawing surface? Could he even see to draw, without light?


    ¡°Whatcha thinking?¡±


    Cassie jumped. ¡°Nothing,¡± she lied. ¡°Just¡­ hoping Mom can find an apartment she likes.¡±


    Matt grunted in agreement and continued his clicking.


    ¡°What are you thinking?¡± Cassie returned.


    Matt hesitated. Cassie had the distinct impression he was also about to lie. ¡°Same,¡± he replied finally. Cassie nodded. The privacy of their mutual falsehoods felt comfortable.


    With the treadmill gone, the bedroom felt both more comfortable and more empty. Without the giant apparatus in the middle of everything to draw the eye, the bare walls were stark. Cassie was momentarily tempted to put up some of the non-incriminating artwork from her portfolio, but immediately discarded the idea. Way too many questions if she did that. She stood in the dark for a moment¡ªshe hadn¡¯t bothered to replace the lightbulb in the gooseneck lamp¡ªand let her eyes adjust. She stepped to the window and looked out longingly for a while; all was still.


    Very deliberately, she turned her back to the window and pulled off her shirt and bra. She slipped off her pants next and sat bare-bottomed on her desk to comb out her hair. It cascaded over her shoulders and down her back, dark against her skin. She half-remembered reading in some childhood novel of girls instructed to apply a hundred strokes to their hair before going to bed, so that is what she did, counting silently. It was far more than was necessary, it turned out, to adequately groom hair even as long and snarl-prone as Cassie¡¯s, but it was soothing. And she hoped Rubus liked what he saw, if he was looking.


    She had her answer the next morning: resting on her desk just where the window had been left open a crack was a printer-paper drawing, rendered in black pencil, of Cassie combing her hair. The rough sketch perfectly captured her shifted weight and half-turned face as she reached for another lock. Cassie looked at it for a long time, holding her breath with pleasure, before tenderly transferring it to her hidden portfolio. She floated down the stairs like a balloon.


    Tyler loomed over Mom at the kitchen table, pointing at something on his laptop over her shoulder and speaking in a low, urgent voice.


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    The balloon popped.


    ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡±


    Both of them startled at the sound of her voice. Tyler¡¯s knuckles whitened on the back of Mom¡¯s chair. ¡°We¡¯re just looking at apartments, sweetheart,¡± said Mom. ¡°Come look; Tyler had some ideas.¡±


    Towed forward by dread, Cassie looked. Beige popcorn ceilings, vertical blinds, and a pool deck of concrete interrupted only by a metal handrail with rust stains at the bottom. ¡°Look at how affordable it is! There¡¯s even a little deck for plants off the bedroom.¡± Mom clicked through to an image of a strip of sill even smaller than Cassie¡¯s miniature balcony. Cassie stared at Tyler. He glared back defiantly. Without another word, Cassie turned on her heel and marched back upstairs.


    ¡°Matt.¡± He was sound asleep in his bedroom, spilling over the edge of his twin bed, mouth open on his pillow. ¡°Matt, wake up. Tyler¡¯s trying to put Mom in a rathole.¡±


    ¡°What?¡± He sat up and looked at the floor blearily. ¡°Rats?¡±


    ¡°No. Tyler¡¯s downstairs, picking out apartments for Mom.¡±


    ¡°Oh shit.¡± Matt instantly became more alert. His hair stuck out at funny angles, but he was still an imposing figure as he lumbered down the hallway in his boxers and t-shirt. Cassie followed at a distance, and arrived in the kitchen just in time to hear Tyler snap, ¡°Oh for fuck¡¯s sake¡ª¡±


    ¡°Kids¡ª¡± Mom started.


    Matt threw up his hands defensively. ¡°I have seen nothing, and I shall judge nothing until I¡¯ve seen it.¡±


    ¡°Cassie runs crying to your room¡ª¡±


    ¡°Do I look like I¡¯m crying, Tyler?¡± Cassie pointed to her face. ¡°Does this look like crying to you?¡±


    ¡°¡ªand you just assume I¡¯m screwing something up¡ª¡±


    ¡°I just want to be part of the process,¡± Matt said placatingly. ¡°I¡¯m not assuming anything.¡±


    ¡°¡ªlike I¡¯m not trusted to have a modicum of competence¡ª¡±


    Cassie and her mother locked eyes and reached a wordless accord. As one, they moved to the back door and exited to the deck, closing the door on the argument behind them. Cassie hissed the breath she had been holding out between her teeth.


    ¡°Mom¡ª¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t want to hear it, Cassie,¡± she said, uncharacteristically sharp. Cassie fell silent in surprise, waiting for more, but Mom just frowned. ¡°Where¡¯s the gnome?¡±


    ¡°What?¡± Cassie looked around. ¡°What do you mean?¡±


    ¡°The gnome that we pulled out of the bushes yesterday¡ªdidn¡¯t we move it up here?¡±


    Cassie developed a sneaking suspicion. ¡°Did we?¡±


    ¡°How odd.¡± Mom stepped off the deck and peered underneath. ¡°Could it have rolled off, do you think? Knocked over by a raccoon maybe?¡±


    ¡°Maybe.¡± Cassie instinctively turned to escape back inside but remembered she didn¡¯t want to be in there, either, as she saw her brothers gesticulating behind the glass. ¡°I have to run some errands today, I¡¯ll be gone for a bit. Want me to pick anything up while I¡¯m out?¡±


    ¡°Milk, please. And eggs, if you don¡¯t mind.¡±


    ¡°Milk and eggs.¡± Cassie pulled open the door.


    ¡°Oh and black beans! We can make tacos tonight, I already have everything else.¡±


    ¡°Milk, eggs, beans, got it.¡± Cassie hurried through the kitchen and up the stairs. Matt and Tyler were no longer gesticulating; Matt was pinching the bridge of his nose as Tyler continued, evidently as part of the same run-on sentence as before: ¡°¡ªand this is the exact same bullshit that I have to deal with at work, so to have to deal with it from my own goddamn family is just absolutely unnecessary¡ª¡± She dressed as quickly as possible and snuck out the front door.


    Cassie¡¯s car looked comical parked between her brothers¡¯. It had been her undergraduate roommate¡¯s family wagon over a decade ago; she had bought it for $750 and a promise not to ask about the stains in the back seat, which was easily accomplished when a bottle of liquid fertilizer leaked all over it during the second day it was in her possession, obliterating anything that might have come before. The corroded paint on the hood was reflected in the mirror-bright finish of Tyler¡¯s black Escalade. Even Matt¡¯s reserved sedan seemed a little offended by the proximity. The engine started on the second try.


    Cassie rattled to the art store and bought several pads of sketch paper, a small palette of watercolors, graphite pencils, colored pencils, a kneaded eraser, a pencil sharpener, a fine-tip pen, and acrylic sealer. She had only meant to buy the paper and sharpener, but here she was at the checkout counter, spending her stipend on art supplies for a paranormal entity living in a bush. She told herself it was justified because the only groceries she¡¯d have to buy in two weeks were milk, eggs, and beans. The real justification was hidden under her bed.


    The supermarket had been completely rearranged since the last time she was there. Cassie wandered the aisles with milk and eggs in her hand basket, looking for beans, when she found herself in the pharmacy section. She drifted to a halt in front of the condoms.


    Did she need to buy any?


    What an unusually complex question. She stared through the wall of boxes as she thought. There were layers to this.


    First of all, did she have any already handy? No. No, she had not brought condoms to her father¡¯s funeral. It was possible she had some ancient emergency condom stashed in her tampon bag or glove compartment, but it would be well past its expiry by now.


    Second, could she be impregnated by a dryad? According to mythology, probably. According to her IUD, probably not.


    Third, could she catch an STI from a dryad? Cassie started shaking with silent laughter. What could she possibly catch from him? Aphids?


    ¡°Cassie?¡±


    Cassie jumped so badly she thought she might have cracked an egg in the carton. A pair of enormous oblate eyes blinked at her from behind coke-bottle glasses. Mom¡¯s photo-taking church friend from the funeral stood beside her, wearing a vest and a nametag. She must work here. Oh my god.


    ¡°Hiiiiiiii!¡± Cassie quavered. Her face began to grow hot.


    ¡°Cassie!¡± she repeated. ¡°I thought I recognized you, my dear. How¡¯s your mother?¡±


    ¡°She¡¯s doing well, all things considered. Thank you.¡±


    ¡°I pray for her every day.¡±


    ¡°Thank you.¡± Cassie tried to sidle away from the condoms, face burning. ¡°I¡¯ll let her know that, I¡¯m sure she¡¯ll appreciate it.¡±


    The huge eyes blinked owlishly. ¡°Can I help you find anything?¡±


    ¡°Beans!¡± Cassie brayed. ¡°I got lost looking for the beans!¡±


    Cassie¡¯s face radiated all the way through the checkout line and into the parking lot, and didn¡¯t begin to cool until after she¡¯d spent five minutes in the car resting her forehead on the steering wheel in defeat.


    Fucking beans.

 Chapter 10. Thorn Circlet

    Some sort of truce had been brokered between Matt and Tyler by the time Cassie returned. Mom looked relieved, Matt looked harried, and Tyler looked concerningly smug. He brushed past Cassie on his way out of the kitchen. Mom heard her phone buzzing on its charger in the other room and went to answer it. Matt sat down at the table with a heavy sigh and began tapping away at his laptop as Cassie put away the groceries. ¡°Do I want to know?¡± she asked, returning to the table.


    ¡°Whether you want to or not,¡± Matt replied wearily, ¡°you need to.¡±


    ¡°Oh god¡ªdid Tyler convince Mom to move into some crapshack?¡±


    Matt sighed again. ¡°No, but it turned into a renegotiation about distribution of proceeds from the house.¡±


    Cassie went cold. ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°So the original plan was that Mom would get half, and the three of us would evenly split the other half. That, plus retirement savings, plus Dad¡¯s pension, plus social security, should keep Mom in decent shape for the rest of her life.¡±


    ¡°Right.¡±


    ¡°Tyler just got Mom to agree to a fixed sum of the proceeds from the sale of the house rather than fifty per cent.¡±


    Cassie went even colder. ¡°How much?¡±


    Matt rubbed his neck. ¡°Well, it works out to about half of what she¡¯s likely to get for the house, honestly. So ideally, no change for her.¡±


    Cassie slumped in relief. ¡°So he just screwed the two of us over, is that it?¡±


    ¡°Not quite.¡± Matt typed some more on his computer then spun it around to show her. ¡°We estimated we¡¯re likely to get this much from the sale of the house. So there¡¯s Mom¡¯s half, here¡¯s my sixth, and there¡¯s your sixth. All now in static dollar form, rather than a percentage.¡±


    ¡°And Tyler¡¯s sixth?¡±


    ¡°Well¡­¡± Matt spun the computer back around again. ¡°He gets the remainder.¡±


    Cassie pondered this for a moment. ¡°He thinks we can actually get more for the house than the estimate you showed me.¡±


    ¡°Presumably.¡±


    ¡°So after you, me, and Mom have taken our allotted dollar amount, he¡¯ll wind up with more than a sixth.¡±


    ¡°That appears to be his thinking, yes.¡±


    ¡°And Mom agreed to this?¡±


    ¡°He pulled the grandchild card.¡±


    ¡°Jesus.¡± Cassie stared out the window. ¡°How can he do this? Aren¡¯t you the executor?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m instructed to follow any changes requested by Mom,¡± Matt said quietly. ¡°Dad and I talked about it a lot, and¡­ he knew the risks. He was lucid till the very end.¡±


    ¡°Those changes weren¡¯t requested. They were coerced.¡±


    ¡°She is of sound body and mind. She is allowed to be convinced. My hands are tied, Cass.¡±


    ¡°I know.¡± Cassie stood up and hugged her brother¡¯s shoulders from behind. ¡°If I¡¯d thought I wouldn¡¯t just make it worse, I¡¯d have stayed to argue.¡±


    Matt chuckled darkly. ¡°Thank you for your timely departure.¡± He nodded at Cassie¡¯s shopping. ¡°What¡¯s in the bag?¡±


    ¡°Art supplies.¡±


    Matt looked mildly surprised. ¡°Are you drawing again?¡±


    ¡°Well, there¡¯s paint, too. Watercolor. It¡¯s been a while. I miss it.¡± Technically, she hadn¡¯t told a single lie. ¡°Do you need me to sign anything for this change in plans?¡±


    ¡°Nope.¡±


    ¡°Okie doke.¡± She dropped a kiss on the top of his head. ¡°Thanks for duking it out with Tyler.¡±


    Matt just grunted.


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    Mom reappeared in the kitchen, pocketing her phone, and began making herself a cup of tea. ¡°So,¡± she said, with studied nonchalance, ¡°Anybody special in your lives, kids?¡±


    Cassie immediately knew who had buzzed Mom¡¯s phone. Probably the entire church now knew that Cassie had been found chuckling to herself in the condom aisle.


    ¡°Nothing past a first date, and not for a few months,¡± Matt said breezily. ¡°Too busy.¡±


    ¡°Me neither,¡± Cassie lied quickly. But she could feel her face beginning its betrayal. Both her mother and brother eyed her. ¡°Hookups don¡¯t count,¡± she added defiantly, hoping to confuse the issue, and stomped up the stairs before her blush could go nuclear.


    She would have to be very careful about sneaking the art supplies into the bramble.


    Cassie¡¯s own phone buzzed just as she set down the bag of art supplies; it was from work, and the notification thumbnail did not look promising. Cassie debated ignoring it, but the thought of some crisis spiraling out of control was too unpleasant. She stood hunched over her bed, thumbing out the last of her response, when there was a knock on her doorjamb.


    ¡°One sec!¡± She hurriedly appended her signature and tossed the phone carelessly onto her bed. ¡°Sorry, work. Again. Did you¡ª¡± Cassie turned around to see Matt standing dumbstruck in her doorway, face white, staring silently at a point just to her side. Casse instinctively looked where he was staring but saw nothing out of the ordinary. ¡°What¡ª¡±


    ¡°Did you make that?¡±


    For a moment, Cassie had the horrific notion that Matt must have seen the nude sketch of her somehow. But he wasn¡¯t looking under the bed. ¡°Make what?¡±


    ¡°That.¡± He pointed at her headboard¡ªat the blackberry-thorn circlet that hung upon its corner.


    ¡°No.¡± The denial was out before she realized what she had admitted. Now it was Cassie¡¯s turn to go white.


    This wasn¡¯t right. Matt shouldn¡¯t be acting like he understood what he had really asked, or what her answer really meant.


    She waited for his demands, accusations, for whatever emotional upheaval he was clearly experiencing to be regurgitated in a torrent on her rug, but instead he turned around and walked away without another word. Cassie heard the door to his bedroom open and close, followed by complete silence.


    Her phone buzzed. She ignored it. All she could think to do was close her own door, sit down on her bed, and stare out the window. An indeterminate amount of time later, she heard Matt come back out, walk down the stairs, and leave the house. Then his car engine purred to life and he drove away. Cassie¡¯s phone buzzed again, and then again. She fumbled it from the bed, set it to Do Not Disturb, and put it down again without reading a single message.


    He knew. Matt knew. Cassie wasn¡¯t sure exactly what he knew, but clearly he knew it.


    The house phone rang, both in the master bedroom and in the kitchen¡ªCassie had forgotten it was all on the same loop¡ªand Mom picked it up. Mom¡¯s side of the conversation sounded very confused. ¡°Cass?¡± she called after a moment.


    ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s for you.¡±


    Cassie was still sitting on her bed with the door shut. She opened the bedroom door, flabbergasted. ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°Some lady from some plant society says they¡¯ve been trying to reach you for ten minutes?¡±


    Cassie¡¯s stomach inverted itself. She raced down the stairs and grabbed the phone with both hands. ¡°Hello?¡±


    ¡°Hello, this is Dr. Evelyn Morales from the American Society of Plant Biologists. We¡¯re trying to reach Dr. Cassandra Harris?¡±


    ¡°Speaking.¡± Cassie¡¯s voice shook.


    ¡°Apologies, we used your emergency number since the primary one listed didn¡¯t seem to be going through and the voicemail was full. We¡¯re calling to inform you that your proposal, Field Evaluation in Ecoregions 2-4 of Apomixis and Propagation in Rosaceae Genera, was selected as a Permaculture Genomics grant winner in Competitive Area 2 for the full amount requested. Congratulations!¡±


    Cassie gaped at her mother, mouth open, clutching the phone so hard it creaked. ¡°Are you serious?¡± she blurted, practically shoving the receiver into her mouth. Mom had clapped her hands on either side of her face, eyes wide and mouth making a tiny O.


    ¡°Absolutely! We¡¯ll be publishing the list of awardees online shortly, but we always call the winners to tell them personally. It¡¯s one of the highlights of my job,¡± she added, smile evident in her voice.


    ¡°I¡ªwh¡ªthank you!¡± Cassie laughed incredulously. ¡°I can¡¯t believe it. Thank you so much! This is wonderful!¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re most welcome, congratulations again! You¡¯ll get some follow up emails shortly, as well as another call to square away some of the funding details, but in the meantime I¡¯ll leave you to celebrate.¡±


    ¡°Thank you!¡± Cassie beamed at the phone. ¡°Thank you!¡± She barely got the receiver back into the cradle, she was trembling so severely. She leaned against the wall for a moment, then looked back at her mother and said stupidly, ¡°I need to clear out my voicemail.¡±


    Mom squealed and clasped her in a tight hug. ¡°Congratulations, Cass! I knew you could do it!¡±


    ¡°I didn¡¯t,¡± Cass laughed, squeezing her back just as tightly. ¡°It was a hell of a long shot, I can¡¯t believe it! Dad will¡ª¡±


    It was like getting punched in the stomach by her own words; she gasped at what she had just said. Dad will nothing. Dad¡¯s dead. Dad¡¯s dead.


    Dad¡¯s dead.


    Head and heart overflowing with grief and fear and pride, Cassie burst into tears. She cried so hard she couldn¡¯t breathe. Too much had happened this hour, this day, this week.


    ¡°I¡¯m sure Dad¡¯s just as proud of you as I am, sweetheart.¡± Mom rubbed Cassie¡¯s back as she sobbed into her shoulder. ¡°He never doubted you for a second either.¡±


    Cassie nodded, grinding snot into her mother¡¯s blouse. It was just too much. Blinded by tears, Cassie let go of Mom and tottered up the stairs. It wasn¡¯t even noon yet, but she was too overwrought to stay conscious; without bothering to do more than kick off her shoes, she climbed onto her bed, burrito¡¯d herself in her patched-up blanket, and fell into a deep and immediate sleep.

 Chapter 11. A Word That We Call Ourselves

    Cassie was four years old.


    The tunnel had seemed bigger then, a yawning emerald portal to another world. She didn¡¯t have to duck to walk through. There were more twists and turns, though, more canes to step over and weeds brushing her ankles. The chain link fence towered overhead, and the vines that trellised up its wire were supple and green, closer to the sun, since the bramble had only recently grown through the fence that summer.


    This wasn¡¯t the first time she had made her way through the gate to the secret bower within. She had already populated the space with an old blanket to sit upon, a keychain compass in case she got lost, and a cookie tin whose inside was lined by her best stickers: her treasure box.


    A boy was crouched in the duff before the open box, picking delicately through her treasures.


    ¡°Hey!¡± Cassie said indignantly. ¡°That¡¯s mine!¡±


    With a flicker of shadow, the boy disappeared. The marble he had been examining fell into the duff without a sound.


    Cassie was overcome with remorse. ¡°Wait!¡± she cried. ¡°Don¡¯t go, I¡¯m sorry! Come back!¡± But nothing stirred.


    She began to weep, certain she had just scared off a fairy. She flung herself to the ground and scrabbled for the marble. ¡°Look,¡± she pleaded, voice gluey with tears, ¡°I¡¯ll show you everything! This one¡¯s a marble. It¡¯s green glass.¡± She put the marble back in the box and pulled out her next treasure, a banded feather. ¡°This is a feather from a kestrel. Daddy says it¡¯s probably a tail feather. Sometimes birds lose their feathers but it¡¯s okay because they can grow new ones.¡± Next out of the box came two coins. ¡°This is a Silver Eagle dollar, and this is a penny I found on the sundial in the Botanical Gardens.¡±


    She methodically worked her way through the contents: a ceramic unicorn, the vertebra of some small creature bleached white by the sun, a polished amethyst, an assortment of holographic stickers. When she had finished, and the boy had not reappeared despite several more tearful entreaties, she left the box open, announced to the void that he was welcome to investigate its contents to his heart¡¯s content, and exited the bramble. She raced to her room and plastered herself to the window with her plastic binoculars, and kept them trained on the blackberry bramble for the rest of the afternoon. She saw nothing.


    She returned the next day with a glitter bead, a book, and two painstakingly-negotiated-for cookies (she had foregone dessert the night before). She added the bead to her treasure box, after describing its properties and provenance aloud, and sat cross-legged on the blanket to describe, in her own words, what happened if you gave a mouse a cookie, stopping to show the pictures at appropriate intervals. She ate one cookie and placed the second one in the middle of the blanket. There was no sign of the boy, so once again she left the bramble and staked it out from her bedroom window. Unable to withstand the suspense for another whole day, she returned late in the afternoon. The cookie was gone.


    She ran back inside. ¡°DADDY!¡± she screamed, ¡°DADDY THE FAIRY ATE MY COOKIE!¡±


    ¡°Did she?¡± Dad was sitting in the kitchen in his scrubs, reading the newspaper he¡¯d missed that morning.


    ¡°No Daddy, it¡¯s a boy fairy.¡±


    ¡°Oh, my mistake.¡± He folded the newspaper away and rested his chin on his hands to give Cassie his full attention. ¡°Did he like it?¡±


    ¡°I think so.¡± Cassie climbed onto her chair next to his. ¡°He ate the whole thing.¡±


    ¡°Wow, he must have really liked it then; that¡¯s a lot of cookie for a little fairy to eat.¡±


    Cassie leaned all the way onto the table in her excitement. ¡°No he¡¯s not a little fairy. He¡¯s the same size as me!¡±


    Her father tapped his lips thoughtfully. ¡°Are you sure he¡¯s a fairy, then?¡±


    Cassie hesitated. When she didn¡¯t answer, he prompted further: ¡°Did he have wings?¡±


    ¡°No.¡±


    ¡°Did he have pointy ears?¡±


    ¡°Umm, I don¡¯t think so.¡±


    ¡°Did he sparkle with fairy dust and drink tea from a buttercup?¡± Dad¡¯s voice was serious, but his eyes crinkled.


    ¡°Nnnnooooooo,¡± Cassie drawled, grinning. ¡°But when I talked to him he disappeared and dropped my marble!¡±


    ¡°Oh, well that does sound appropriately magical. Very fairy-like. Will he require more cookies?¡±


    ¡°Yes.¡±


    ¡°I thought he might.¡± Dad stood and reached into the cookie jar on top of the refrigerator and pulled another one out. ¡°Don¡¯t tell your mom,¡± he whispered, and furtively slid it along the table to Cassie. ¡°Thank you!¡± she squealed, and ran back outside.


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    There was no sign of the boy as she scrambled through to leave the extra cookie on the blanket. She sat still for a moment on her knees, peering into the gloom; nothing moved, but she had the distinct sensation of being watched. ¡°I got another cookie for you,¡± she called softly. Still nothing. Cassie heard her name from the kitchen. ¡°I have to go now,¡± Cassie said. ¡°I hope you like it.¡±


    She tried a different tactic the next day. Armed with a book, a carton of chocolate milk sprouting a crazy straw, and one of Tyler¡¯s rejected Hotwheels (it was pink), she took a sip and then rested the milk in the duff just beyond arm¡¯s reach. She placed the toy car next to it. Then she settled in and began to ¡®read¡¯ her book, studiously ignoring her surroundings. After a minute, feigning fatigue, she lay down on the blanket, pillowing her head uncomfortably on top of her treasure box. Following a couple of ludicrously overacted yawns, she closed her eyes and pretended to sleep.


    For a while¡ªa long while, in her estimation¡ªnothing happened. Birds chirped and rustled. The occasional car drove by on the street. Tyler and Matt were at soccer and math camp, respectively, so there was none of the usual brotherly rumpus. Dad was at the clinic and Mom was quilting inside. It was the perfect time to lure a fairy.


    There was a faint noise, as of a small plastic wheel being spun on a tiny axle.


    Cassie opened her eyes to the barest of slits. The boy was there, crouched on his skinny haunches, gently flicking each wheel of the toy car in turn to make it spin. He wore rough brown pants of an indeterminate fabric, cuffed above the ankles of his bare feet, and a thin black sweater. His hair was black and very messy; Cassie could see a number of leaves caught up in its tangle, and a caterpillar inched along one strand. She couldn¡¯t even see if his ears were pointy under that thicket. His eyes were the same improbable green as the glass marble in her treasure box.


    Cassie risked opening her eyes all the way but otherwise didn¡¯t move. He didn¡¯t notice. He picked up the milk carton and examined each side, pausing once or twice to sniff it like a wild animal. Only when he went to put the milk down again did he see Cassie was awake. He locked eyes with her and froze.


    She didn¡¯t speak, afraid she would scare him away again. There was no expression in his face, but his body was as taut as a rabbit about to bolt. Cassie just lay there and breathed around her pounding heart. Finally, when she could bear it no longer, she whispered, ¡°Hello.¡±


    For an instant, it became hard to see him, as though there had never been a boy there at all but merely a very unusual concatenation of thorny vine and shadow that gave the illusion of a crouching boy. But a moment later he reappeared, behind a spray of canes, as though to keep something between himself and Cassie for protection. He didn¡¯t answer, but his eyes never left hers.


    Cassie risked raising her head slowly. When he didn¡¯t move, she sat up all the way and wrapped her arms around her knees, trying to make herself look as small and unthreatening as possible. ¡°Hello,¡± she tried again.


    ¡°Hello.¡± The voice was a breath of wind through the leaves. It didn¡¯t seem to come from the boy at all. She wasn¡¯t sure his mouth had moved.


    ¡°Are you a fairy?¡±


    There was an uncertain wavering of vines. ¡°What is a fairy?¡± whispered the wind.


    Cassie was stumped. Fairies were self-evident. ¡°They¡ªit¡¯s¡ªfairies are tiny people with magic. Sometimes they grant wishes or make shoes or¡ªor¡ªtake teeth. The ones with wings fly around.¡±


    There was a polite pause while this information was considered, then: ¡°No.¡± For the first time, the voice clearly emanated from the boy. He crept forward again cautiously and sat just beyond her reach. ¡°I am not a fairy.¡±


    ¡°Oh.¡± Cassie tried to hide her disappointment. ¡°That¡¯s okay,¡± she rallied charitably, ¡°You can still have the chocolate milk.¡± She watched as the boy raised the milk carton and eyed it uncertainly.


    ¡°You drink it by sucking through the straw,¡± Cassie explained. When he still looked baffled, she held out her hand. ¡°I¡¯ll show you.¡± He observed while she demonstrated and gave it back. Cassie watched as he hesitantly operated the crazy straw. ¡°Are you a ghost?¡±


    ¡°What is a ghost?¡±


    This one was easier. ¡°It¡¯s the spirit of a dead person.¡±


    ¡°No. I am alive.¡± He sipped at the milk.


    Cassie had exhausted her limited knowledge of the supernatural at this point. The only other option vaguely occurring to her was wizard but those were old men with beards. ¡°So you¡¯re just a boy then.¡± Boys couldn¡¯t disappear, though. ¡°Are you a magic boy?¡± He didn¡¯t answer; he was slowly extracting the crazy straw for further examination. ¡°What¡¯s your name?¡±


    ¡°What is a name?¡±


    If she hasn¡¯t already been looking right at him, Cassie would have done a double take. This sounded like the sort of deliberately obtuse answer Tyler might give in a fit of obnoxiousness, but this boy appeared completely serious. ¡°It¡¯s a word that we call ourselves. My name is Cassandra Nicole Harris.¡±


    The boy looked puzzled. ¡°That is three words.¡±


    This was a fair point. ¡°My nickname is Cassie. That¡¯s only one word. You can call me that.¡±


    ¡°Cassie.¡±


    ¡°Yes. What¡¯s your name?¡±


    He seemed troubled. ¡°I don¡¯t know.¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t know!¡± Cassie searched again for any signs that he was putting her on, but found none. ¡°Did you forget?¡±


    ¡°No,¡± he replied, a bit defensively. ¡°I¡¯ve never had one.¡±


    ¡°Everybody has a name. It¡¯s the law,¡± Cassie declared. ¡°What do your mommy and daddy call you?¡±


    He turned his attention back to reinserting the straw into the milk carton and didn¡¯t reply.


    ¡°You don¡¯t have to tell me your real name,¡± Cassie persisted, ¡°but I have to have something to call you.¡±


    He turned his luminous eyes to hers in abrupt interest. ¡°What do you want to call me?¡±


    Cassie felt her face grow hot. ¡°Um.¡± She looked down and picked at the duff. ¡°I don¡¯t know.¡±


    ¡°You can make a name up for me,¡± he offered solemnly.


    Cassie sensed a hook. ¡°I¡¯ll have to think about it,¡± she said. ¡°Can I tell you tomorrow?¡±


    ¡°Yes.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ll be here? In the blackberry?¡±


    ¡°Yes.¡±


    Cassie felt very pleased with her cleverness. ¡°Okay, then. I¡¯ll tell you tomorrow.¡±

 Chapter 12. Tooth and Thorn

    It was midafternoon when Cassie awoke. She was so thoroughly disoriented, she was momentarily unsure of when she was¡ªshe might be four years old, or fourteen, or twenty-four. It was the silence that fixed her to the present; no thumps or bangs from Tyler, no waterproof radio in the shower from Dad, no kitchen clatter from Mom. Just afternoon silence in a room with no pictures on the walls. She was alone.


    She unrolled herself from her sweaty blanket-burrito, causing something to rustle to the floor: the bag of art supplies she had bought a million years ago this morning. Well now was the perfect time, wasn¡¯t it? Too addled to think to make herself presentable, Cassie scuffed her shoes back on and scooped up the bag. She grabbed her gardening gloves on the way out the back door as an alibi in case anybody came home before she returned.


    Rubus was waiting for her as soon as she slipped past the gate, standing barefoot and tall in the center of the bower. Sunlight dappled his arms, and for the first time he appeared clean-shaven. His hair was still long and rough, but it was no longer the unruly thicket it had been.


    Cassie set the bag and gloves down. ¡°The trim suits you.¡±


    ¡°Thank you.¡± He watched her pull each item out of the bag with great interest. ¡°What was the excitement in the house this morning?¡±


    Cassie sighed. ¡°Tyler being a dick. He¡¯s got kids number four and five on the way, and he¡¯s panicking about money, so he¡¯s jerking Mom around to try and get more than his fair share. Matt managed to stave him off¡ªmostly¡ªbut it¡¯s always such an ordeal with him.¡± She didn¡¯t elaborate on the specifics. She wasn¡¯t ready to think through the ramifications of selling the house, let alone breaking the news to Rubus. Later. There would be time later. ¡°Shall I show you how to use the art supplies?¡±


    ¡°Yes please.¡±


    Cassie knelt in the duff and sharpened a few of the pencils, explaining what she was doing as she went, and used the first page of a sketchpad to demonstrate them. The erasers and pen came next, and she finished it with the acrylic sealer. The watercolors she simply described and set aside. Rubus, kneeling across from her, picked up each item after she was done using it, long fingers turning and probing inquisitively. As he picked up the watercolor set, he asked, ¡°What was the excitement after the house phone rang?¡±


    ¡°Oh!¡± Cassie straightened up, a smile spreading across her face. ¡°I won a grant!¡±


    He set the watercolors down again and focused on Cassie¡¯s smile. ¡°What¡¯s a grant?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s money from the government to go learn something new.¡± If he was about to ask her what the government was, she was going to have a hard time with that, but he simply asked, ¡°What will you be learning?¡±


    ¡°Well, the title of my grant is Field Evaluation in Ecoregions 2-4 of Apomixis and Propagation in Rosaceae Genera, but that¡¯s pretty opaque so let me break it down.¡± Cassie used her hands as brackets around the words she could see in her head. Rubus watched as though he could see the words as well.


    ¡°¡®Field evaluation¡¯ means I will be going out and looking at things in nature, in the wild, rather than just in a laboratory. ¡®Ecoregions¡¯ are areas of land that have a particular set of natural characteristics¡ªgeology, weather, plants, animals, that sort of thing. A valley might be one ecoregion, or a desert, or a range of mountains.¡± Her words were animated by unconscious gestures: fingers dipped together for the valley, peaked for mountains. Rubus sat enthralled. ¡°Ecoregions two and three are the Puget Lowland and Willamette Valley marine west-coast forests, and ecoregion four is the Cascades.¡±


    ¡°Where are those ecoregions?¡±


    ¡°Here, generally speaking.¡± Cassie waved vaguely. ¡°A strip of land crossing north-south through Oregon and Washington, a bit inland from the coast. Good territory for wild varieties of edible cultivars of Rosaceae, both native and invasive¡ªplums, serviceberries, cherries, raspberries.¡± Cassie smiled. ¡°Blackberries.¡±


    Rubus smiled back. ¡°What is ¡®apomixis¡¯?¡±


    ¡°Asexual reproduction via clone seeds.¡±


    Rubus absorbed this information in silence, looking thoughtful. Cassie imagined he was probably trying¡ªand failing¡ªto square that statement with whatever hodgepodge of facts he¡¯d learned from the tumbleweed. ¡°Boots on or off?¡± wasn¡¯t really in the same philosophical realm.


    ¡°The Rosaceae family is absolutely enormous,¡± Cassie continued. ¡°It¡¯s got species everywhere except Antarctica. Roses, almonds, apples, rowan trees¡ªthey¡¯re all in the same family. And nobody really knows exactly how many species there are. Almost five thousand, spread across nearly a hundred genera, but scientists aren¡¯t sure about the taxonomy¡ªhow to properly organize them into groups and subgroups. When plants are capable of reproducing sexually and asexually¡ªcombining their genes with another plants¡¯ or just using their own genetic material¡ªit makes it really hard to figure out the best way to organize the groups.¡±


    ¡°And that¡¯s what you¡¯re hoping to learn?¡± Rubus asked. ¡°How to organize the groups?¡±


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    ¡°Well I don¡¯t expect to actually learn the entire answer,¡± Cassie replied, ¡°but I do expect to help add to the body of knowledge that will help us all figure out more pieces of the answer. That¡¯s usually how science works.¡±


    ¡°So you are going to go around Ecoregions Two through Four,¡± Rubus said, ¡°and see how Rosaceae plants have sex.¡±


    Cassie¡¯s voice died in her throat. She had never felt like a bigger pervert. ¡°No,¡± she retorted defensively, ¡°I¡¯m going to see which Rosaceae plants aren¡¯t having sex!¡± That sounded bad. ¡°By collecting their seeds.¡± Worse.


    The expression in Rubus¡¯ face was unreadable, but the bower began to grow darker. Truly, in the context of dryads, there was no way to salvage this conversation. Dr. Cassandra Harris, professional plant voyeur.


    ¡°I should go.¡± She moved to stand and leave, but her jeans were caught on something. She looked down; thorny vines had twined loosely about her calves. The denim was thick enough to keep the thorns from piercing through as long as she stayed where she was, but if she moved they might. Cassie stayed on the ground and looked up at Rubus in the darkening gloom. Even kneeling as they were, he towered over her, smelling faintly of wet leaves. She searched his shadowed face, looking for anger or disgust. Jealousy. Betrayal.


    Instead, she found hope. Eagerness.


    Lust.


    His voice whispered from the bramble as it twisted close about her: ¡°You want to learn how Rubus Armeniacus of Rosaceae has sex?¡±


    Cassie stared. Something brushed her arm. Leaves. Fingers.


    ¡°You want to learn?¡± he asked again.


    Cassie swallowed and closed her eyes. ¡°Yes.¡±


    The world tilted. Cassie flung her arms forward, but there was nothing there. She was being lifted, her clothes dragged inexorably from her outstretched limbs by thorns that never broke the skin, helped by fingers alternating between busy removal and caress. Rubus found her throat as her shirt was pulled over her head; the lingering kiss against her pulse was followed by something sharp, but she couldn¡¯t tell if it was tooth or thorn.


    Whether he rose to meet her or the bramble lowered her, she couldn¡¯t tell, but Rubus was below her then, her whole front lying upon lean muscle and rigid bone, warm as the sun on a leaf. With his arms wrapped around her and legs entwined with hers, he kissed everything he could reach: her shoulder, her chest, her ear, her lips. Cassie put her hand out, down, trying to touch the ground beneath his back for purchase against the onslaught of his passion, but she felt only air.


    They were suspended¡ªhe was suspended, and she was perched upon him¡ªor else they had passed beyond some threshold of the world to a vertiginous firmament. She stopped questing for the ground in the dark and simply clung to his frame. Both his hands were on her hips, sliding her lower, until she could feel him against her. Lifting her. Within her.


    Cassie dug her fingers into his flesh and hissed in pleasure, eyes closed, holding still. Rubus seemed equally keen to simply wait, hold, taut as a wire. Perhaps he was already on the edge. She opened her eyes, but it was too dark to make out more than the suggestion of a male body, his gaze trained resolutely on whatever distant, imaginary point allowed him to maintain control.


    Cassie shifted.


    Rubus closed his eyes and redoubled his grip upon her hips. It didn¡¯t hurt, but when she tried to move again she found she couldn¡¯t. She was immobilized, captive between hands and body in a grip as unyielding as the trunk of an oak. Cassie could do nothing but wait, and feel, and sense the canes weaving a silent tapestry about them both.


    Finally, with a long exhalation that she felt rather than heard, Rubus moved. He had taken over the backyard like this, Cassie realized. Slow on a human scale, but fast as lightning for most plants. And utterly unstoppable. She grabbed unthinkingly at the hands on her hips. The dryad caught his breath for a moment before resuming his controlled glissade. Plant he may be, but not entirely.


    Even at this tempo¡ªperhaps because of it¡ªCassie could feel herself beginning to unravel. Kissy Cassie, not a dozen languid thrusts in and already the pressure had started to gather at her center. ¡°Please,¡± she gasped. He didn¡¯t respond, didn¡¯t change his pace, eyes gleaming in the dark as he watched her writhe in his hands, felt her tightening around him. ¡°If you keep¡ªI can¡¯t¡ª¡±


    ¡°Do you want me to stop?¡± His voice rolled around her. One leaf caressed her shoulder, another lifted her hair from her neck. A third brushed her ear, making her shudder and stippling that entire side of her body with goosebumps. She leaned into the touch. ¡°No,¡± she moaned, ¡°I just want you to know¡­¡± She stopped. The leaves had found her where she was softest, and still he was moving inside her. She moaned again, wordlessly this time.


    ¡°Tell me,¡± he said.


    But she couldn¡¯t speak. She held absolutely still as the orgasm gathered itself, roiling from extremities to core, until he slid her down one last time and the waves unleashed. She didn¡¯t cry out; her throat had seized shut with the intensity of the pleasure, so her mouth was parted silently as she shuddered. He waited, rigid, his hands still, his leaves never ceasing their feathery touch. But even through her waning spasms, Cassie could feel his tension between her thighs. He wasn¡¯t far behind.


    She would have collapsed upon his chest had he not been holding her upright, with two hands upon her hips and innumerable leaves pressed about the rest of her body in dappled support. Something tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry,¡± Cassie gasped. She reached an unsteady hand out and braced against his chest.


    ¡°Why are you sorry?¡± His voice rumbled between her thighs.


    ¡°I didn¡¯t mean to come so soon.¡±


    The rumble now was below the level of hearing, and came from all around. ¡°It felt good.¡± He stretched the word like a vine seeking the sun.


    The leaves pulled away. Finally moving his hands, he stroked down her thighs, then back up over her ribs to her breasts. That soon after an orgasm, the barest touch was enough to make Cassie shiver, almost flinch, and clench about him. A breeze hissed through the leaves. ¡°Will you do it again?¡± he asked, running a finger down her sternum. ¡°With me?¡± His finger stopped, awaiting her response.


    She smiled. ¡°Yes.¡±

 Chapter 13. Light and Shadow

    No sooner had she spoken than she was whirled about. She thought for a dizzy moment she might be upside down. But once her inner ear settled, she realized Rubus had simply lifted her off and turned her to face the other direction, straddling his lap, feet once again dangling into empty space.


    He had sat up as well; Cassie could feel the heat of him, nearly radiant, against her back, and his breath on her ear. She folded her legs beneath him¡ªthere was still nothing there¡ªand arched backwards, tilting her face up to his, reaching to draw him into a kiss. She managed to touch her lips to the bottom of his jaw while he trailed his fingers over her body. One of his hands slid between her legs. The other curled around her neck.


    Cassie had a sudden vision of the backyard when she had looked at it from the deck during her father¡¯s funeral; vines coiled about the sundial, spiraling up the poles of the swingset, choking out the other plants. Her pulse leaped.


    ¡°I can feel your heart,¡± Rubus murmured, nuzzling her hair. ¡°Here¡ª¡± his hand tightened briefly around Cassie¡¯s neck, ¡°and here.¡± He worked his other hand deeper between her legs.


    Thorns prickled delicately at her toes from the fathomless dark. She twisted against him, trying instinctively to flee the torturous tickle, but he tightened his grip and whispered something wordless in her ear. Pinioned at throat and groin, all she could do was tremble while the prickling crept up her legs and across her arms. She could sense the thorns just beyond¡ªthe ones not quite touching the soft, exposed arch of her body between Rubus¡¯ hands. But they were there, in the dark.


    She couldn¡¯t move, so he moved for her, shifting until he had eased himself within her once more with a dark groan.


    Cassie¡¯s arms were still raised, her hands touching his head and neck; she couldn¡¯t lower them now, not without slicing her elbows to ribbons. She dug her fingers into his hair to hold on, working them through the thorns with specimen-handling grace until she reached the safety of his scalp. Rubus shuddered at the touch. The fingers at Cassie¡¯s throat tightened; she could feel every bone in his hand when she swallowed against it.


    Pressure began to build again as Rubus continued with hands and stamen and vine. Leaves caressed her tenderly once more, skimming over ribs and stomach, reaching down to brush at her hips and up to graze her collarbone. There was no way she could speak to warn him this time; she was barely getting enough air to breathe as it was. But she didn¡¯t have to. Just as she crested the rise of her second orgasm, spasming against her living fetters, the bower pulsed around her¡ªand Rubus drove himself into her with silent force, again and again. Cassie felt the surge of his seed within her, met and matched by her own convulsions.


    She was only dimly aware of the jabs that accompanied his release, from the thorns that slipped from his control as he came. And she was completely unaware of how they made it back to the ground after that. There was a muddle of panting and vertigo, the support of Rubus¡¯ arms around her shoulders and under the backs of her knees, and then he was laying her in the duff.


    She did not know how long it took her to recover her senses, but when she was next aware of her surroundings, she was looking up at the roof of the bower. It had thinned to a lucent green, dotting the space with light and shadow that shifted in the breeze. Rubus lay beside her, eyes closed, holding her hand.


    Cassie rolled over cautiously and pillowed her head on his shoulder, just at the soft crook of the joint where his arm met his chest. The afternoon peace of the bower remained unbroken. Birds cheeped and rustled. A raven croaked somewhere overhead. Rubus¡¯ chest rose and fell slowly with each breath. She thought he might be asleep.


    Did dryads sleep?


    He had said he would answer her questions. Now they crowded her mind, clamoring to be asked. As reluctant as she was to break the tranquility, she had to know. She couldn¡¯t stop herself.


    ¡°Are you asleep?¡±


    ¡°No.¡± Rubus¡¯ voice was low and content. Cassie snuggled closer and was rewarded with a closed-eyed smile.


    ¡°Do you sleep?¡±


    ¡°In a way. Not as deeply as you seem to.¡± Cassie thought of the little drawings gifted to her in the night. She had assumed it was a bird carrying them up to the second floor, ferrying paper in its beak instead of worms, but perhaps that wasn¡¯t how it had happened. Blackberries were notoriously proficient climbers, after all. ¡°I sleep more in the winter,¡± Rubus added.


    ¡°Do you dream?¡±


    ¡°Yes.¡±


    ¡°What do you dream about?¡±


    Rubus opened his eyes. ¡°All sorts of things. Memories and impossibilities, all jumbled together. Mostly they make no sense, but they often have a strong feeling.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s your earliest memory?¡±


    Rubus lay still, thinking. ¡°The sun,¡± he answered, after a while. ¡°I remember being cold, and a little sad, until I felt the warmth of the sun on me. I thought maybe it would only last for a moment and be gone again, but it stayed. It made me happy.¡±


    ¡°How old were you?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know. Young. I hadn¡¯t grown through the fence yet.¡±


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    Cassie mulled over her next question carefully, and still managed to fumble it. ¡°Did you¡ªdo you¡ªhave¡­ parents? Or did you just¡­ grow? From a seed?¡±


    ¡°I think,¡± Rubus replied with significantly more equanimity than Cassie had asked, ¡°I just grew. I have no memory of a parent. Only the sun, and the rain, and the earth.¡±


    ¡°How did you learn to speak?¡±


    ¡°I listened.¡± Rubus brushed a hand over her hair, solicitously picking out leaves as he found them, and did not offer additional detail.


    Cassie took a deep breath before asking her next question, cringing at the appallingly inappropriate post-coital conversation topic but, as a botanist, unable to leave the question unasked: ¡°Blackberry plants are hermaphroditic. They have both male and female biology. Your thicket has borne berries. How is it that you¡ª¡± Cassie pressed her hand against his chest, indicating his person¡ª ¡°are male?¡± Exquisitely male, she thought, but kept that part to herself.


    When he didn¡¯t answer, Cassie raised herself on one elbow to read his face. He looked utterly flummoxed. ¡°I just am,¡± he replied quietly. ¡°I¡¯m sorry, I don¡¯t know how to answer that question. I didn¡¯t make a choice. Every time I¡¯ve stepped out, I¡¯ve been a boy. A man. Male.¡±


    ¡°When was the first time you stepped out?¡±


    ¡°When you were a baby.¡± He smiled faintly at the memory. ¡°Your father was teaching your brothers how to fold and throw paper airplanes in the backyard, and I was watching. You were in a bassinet in the shade with your mother. One of the airplanes got stuck in my bramble. You waved your fists and cooed every time an airplane flew by, but nobody threw any to you, so when nobody was looking, I took the paper airplane and threw it into your bassinet. I needed hands for that.¡± Rubus reached up and stroked Cassie¡¯s face. ¡°Hands are much better for that sort of thing.¡±


    Cassie took his hand in hers and turned to kiss his palm, then laced her fingers through his. ¡°What determines whether a plant develops a dryad?¡±


    ¡°What do you mean?¡±


    ¡°You said before that not all blackberry bushes have dryads. How is this bush different from those? If I compared samples, would I find any differences?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know,¡± Rubus replied. ¡°Would you like to take a sample and look?¡±


    ¡°Oh! Yes, please!¡± Cassie cried. Rubus looked momentarily shocked at her sudden fierce delight, then erupted in a broad smile of his own. ¡°I don¡¯t have my specimen collection supplies with me, but I¡¯m sure I could make do with supplies from the kitchen. Or maybe,¡± Cassie gabbled, ¡°maybe I could do a run back to the lab to get my field kit? Or, no¡ªI bet I could pop by the store real quick and get something together. The lab¡¯s a long drive, no idea how I¡¯d explain it to Mom, and¡ªoh. Shit.¡± Cassie¡¯s hands flew to her face. ¡°I have to quit my job.¡±


    ¡°Because of the grant?¡±


    ¡°Yes! Yes.¡± Cassie sat up. ¡°I should probably wait until the award has been publicly posted, though¡ªgive my boss a chance to work out a response rather than putting him on the spot.¡± Her voice caught on the last word, and she coughed. Between her panting and Rubus¡¯ hold, her throat was a little raw. ¡°Would you like me to get you some water?¡± she asked politely, and started to cast about for her clothing. It had disappeared, along with the art supplies.


    ¡°No thank you, I already have water.¡±


    ¡°You do?¡± Cassie coughed in surprise.


    Rubus sat up as well, thorns disappearing from his hair as he rose, and cupped his hands together. ¡°Would you like some?¡±


    Clear water pooled in the dryad¡¯s hands. Cassie touched it in wonder, then placed her hands around his and brought them to her mouth. She drank greedily, dribbling a little. His hands never seemed to empty. When she was done, she sat back, breathing hard. ¡°Thank you.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re welcome.¡± He looked pleased with himself, and smudged some droplets from her chest with dry fingers.


    The crump of a car door shutting nearby caught Cassie¡¯s attention. She listened for the sound of jingling keys and the front door, but instead, she heard the clatter of the side gate. Somebody was coming directly into the backyard.


    Cassie sat transfixed in literal naked horror. She turned scarlet.


    Rubus responded more productively. Instantly clothed in black pants and a green t-shirt, he slowly unfurled to his full height, eyes becoming bright as the hollow dimmed. Thorns reemerged in his hair. Vines slithered silently over one another and through the fence, binding the gate shut. The birds fell silent as the air grew thick with the smell of fertile decay. He held that pose for a long moment, staring through the wall of greenery, before relaxing slightly and tilting his head. ¡°It¡¯s Matt,¡± whispered the wind in the leaves.


    ¡°Matt?¡± Cassie mouthed. She desperately wanted to put her clothing back on, but she didn¡¯t think she could do it without making a noise, so instead she huddled around her knees and attempted to Lady Godiva her hair, with minimal success. There was a soft rustle from the backyard¡ªsomething was lightly placed upon the bramble¡ªand then silence. Cassie barely breathed. Rubus didn¡¯t move.


    An interminable wait later, the side gate rattled open and banged shut again, and a car engine purred to life before fading away. Cassie let out her breath and immediately scrabbled for her clothes as the air lightened. The vines relaxed and unknotted themselves, and as Cassie pulled her head through her shirt, she saw Rubus hold out his hand. There was an undulation in the cane, and then something was placed in his hand: a blackberry circlet, small enough to comfortably rest on the head of a child, brittle and dry and leafless with age but otherwise whole.


    Rubus turned it over in his hands. ¡°This is too small for Matt now,¡± he declared, after evidently concluding his examination. ¡°I will make him a new one. Will you bring it to him?¡±


    Cassie stood with her jaw slack, unable to marshal a single coherent response. Materially confirming Rubus¡¯ existence to Matt could have some pretty wild consequences, even if he didn¡¯t know¡ªdidn¡¯t remember, if he had ever known¡ªwhat Rubus was. And if he did¡­ well. How would that conversation even go? Hey Matt, remember that kid in the bushes? Yeah, he¡¯s a dryad. We¡¯re fucking.


    Then again, if Matt had come here¡ªalone, to the best of his knowledge¡ªto return the circlet, there was a good chance he already knew, or at least suspected. And Rubus so earnestly wanted him to have it. ¡°Y-y-yes,¡± Cassie finally stammered, ¡°Yes, I will.¡±


    Rubus nodded soberly. ¡°Thank you.¡±


    Afraid that another family member would return and find her in the bramble¡ªor else buttonhole her in the kitchen while sap dampened her pants¡ªCassie finished dressing and pulled Rubus into a swift tiptoe kiss. He immediately encircled her, lifting her off her feet and squeezing so hard Cassie¡¯s back cracked; she smiled against his mouth and wriggled free. ¡°I have to go.¡±


    He set her down again, withdrawing his embrace reluctantly, and stepped back as vines pulled the gate open and the tunnel formed beyond. ¡°When will you return?¡±


    Cassie took a leaf that had been worrying at her hair¡ªunconsciously, she suspected¡ªand kissed it. ¡°The next time I¡¯m alone,¡± she promised, and slipped through the gate.

 Chapter 14. Cash Deal

    Cassie was just stepping out of the shower when Mom came home. ¡°Oh good, you¡¯re awake!¡± Cassie leaned over the banister, toweling off her hair, and watched her mother bustle from the car to the kitchen twice more, clutching at grocery bags. ¡°I know you already grabbed beans, sweetheart,¡± she called, ¡°but we need to celebrate! I got some champagne, and some cheese and crackers. And ingredients for an apple cake!¡± Her voice disappeared into the kitchen and whatever she said next was lost. She was probably outlining plans to cook enough food for a dozen people.


    ¡°Thanks, Mom!¡± Cassie yelled. ¡°I¡¯ll be down in a minute!¡±


    Cassie alternated between helping prepare too much food, replying to the congratulatory texts of her colleagues, and composing her resignation letter. Mom turned on the radio and sang snatches of whatever lyrics she could recall, humming the rest. Tyler arrived shortly after dark, but by that point Cassie had worked her way through half of the first bottle of champagne and had little trouble deliberately missing the backhandedness of his compliments. By the time Matt had arrived¡ªlate, and uncharacteristically reserved¡ªCassie was sashaying across the kitchen and serenading her taco in tune with the radio, which she had turned up. Mom was grilling Tyler about matching twin quilts, forcing him to repeatedly consult his wife via text. Matt leaned over Dad¡¯s empty chair, nursing his single glass of champagne, and asked Cassie about her fieldwork plans. She didn¡¯t stop dancing as she answered.


    The apple cake needed time to cool in the pan, so, at their mother¡¯s behest, the three siblings ambled around the house digesting their tacos, looking for things they might like to take to their own homes when she moved out. Matt and Tyler had already worked through the ties and cufflinks and other assorted paternal items; now all three laid claim to the communal ones. Cassie picked two guest quilts, a framed photograph, and three mugs. Matt took seven mugs (¡°Look, I drink a LOT of coffee at the office, okay?¡±) and a potted snakeplant (Sansevieria cylindrica). Tyler cleared out half the linen closet.


    It wasn¡¯t so bad to do it this way, Cassie thought, cloaking herself in one of the quilts, flush with champagne and success. But Dad¡¯s chair was still empty when they reconvened at the table for dessert.


    And then Tyler made it worse.


    ¡°So.¡± Tyler squashed apple cake crumbs with the back of his fork. ¡°Linda says she has a potential buyer. For the house.¡±


    Matt, Cassie, and Mom all stared at him. ¡°I don¡¯t understand,¡± Mom said, just as Cassie spluttered, ¡°The house isn¡¯t even on the market yet!¡± Matt frowned but said nothing.


    ¡°They can pay cash.¡±


    Cassie and Mom both looked to Matt for elucidation. His frown deepened. ¡°That¡¯s good for them, but makes no difference for us,¡± he said slowly. ¡°We¡¯re not in a hurry. We shouldn¡¯t accept an offer without allowing the opportunity for competitive bids.¡±


    Tyler made a derisive noise. ¡°Yeah, if you want to sit around waiting to clear escrow. Or not.¡±


    ¡°Why are you in such a hurry?¡± Cassie demanded. She ignored her mother¡¯s imploring look. The champagne had turned in her stomach and was running sour through her veins. ¡°You obviously need money. Why?¡±


    ¡°Well some of us have to work for a living, Cass,¡± Tyler sneered. ¡°We can¡¯t all get taxpayer money to run around conducting little science experiments.¡±


    ¡°Tyler!¡± Mom barked, but she was drowned out by a sudden explosive thump. Plates and glasses and cutlery all jumped, tinkling. Everyone around the table jumped, too¡ªexcept Matt. He had slammed his two massive fists onto the table, flushed with rage.


    ¡°How dare you!¡± he thundered. Tyler flinched away so hard his chair wobbled. ¡°How dare you belittle Cassie¡¯s accomplishments!¡±


    ¡°She¡ª¡± Tyler started.


    ¡°No!¡± Matt bellowed. ¡°Shut up! Shut up! This is not about Cassie. This is about you! You and your fragile fucking ego!¡± If Mom lodged an objection to the language, it was lost in Matt¡¯s tirade. ¡°Just because you got passed over for that promotion does not give you the right to shit all over everybody else¡¯s successes. And you know what? Small wonder they did! I wouldn¡¯t want you to be my manager, and it sounds like everybody else agrees! Because you make people feel bad about themselves! And furthermore¡ª¡± Matt paused to take a deep breath, ¡°you always have! As far back as I can remember, you have gone out of your way to boss people around and hassle them when they object, or even just choose something different for themselves than what you would have chosen. Remember when I wanted the rainbow bicycle? Or, shit, when I wanted to major in philosophy? I don¡¯t even get why. You¡¯ve got a great life. Loving wife, buncha kids, nice car. You don¡¯t always get to have everything. Jesus. Just exist in your own fucking lane and be happy when other people enjoy theirs.¡±


    Matt clenched and unclenched his fists, breathing hard. Tyler muttered something inaudible about the bicycle¡ªwhy he had latched onto that single point in particular, Cassie had no idea¡ªprompting Matt to thump the table again and roar, ¡°NOBODY WOULD HAVE CALLED ME GAY EXCEPT YOU, TYLER! And who cares if they had? Fuck your homophobia!¡±


    He stood up roughly, juddering the chair back, and turned to Cassie. ¡°Congratulations on your grant. Sorry I ruined your party. Mom, the cake was delicious. I¡¯m going now. Goodbye.¡± And he grabbed his satchel, yanked his coat from the back of the chair, and stormed out of the house.


    Cassie turned to Tyler as the door slammed. ¡°For the record,¡± she said, ¡°Matt didn¡¯t ruin the party. You did.¡±


    ¡°Fuck off,¡± Tyler snapped, shoving himself away from the table. He gathered his keys and phone with a shaking hand. ¡°I¡¯ll tell Linda the cash deal is off,¡± he said to Mom, ¡°but we¡¯ve still got to talk about scheduling the hardscapers and the inspector. I¡¯ll see you tomorrow.¡± He didn¡¯t look at either of them before stalking out after his brother.


    Cassie concentrated on breathing in and out while her mother stared into space with bags under her eyes. ¡°Where did I go wrong?¡± Mom asked finally.


    ¡°You didn¡¯t,¡± Cassie replied at once. ¡°You¡¯re a great mom. Tyler is nobody¡¯s fault but his own. I suppose I¡¯m my own fault, too.¡±


    This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it


    Mom sat in her chair, looking defeated, then put her face in her hands. ¡°You never fought like this when your father was alive.¡±


    ¡°Oh, Mom.¡± Cassie scraped her chair over the linoleum and pulled her mother into a hug. ¡°We did, actually,¡± she controverted apologetically, patting her mother¡¯s back. ¡°All the time. Just not usually in front of you or Dad. A lot worse than that sometimes. Poor Matt always tried to mediate. I guess he¡¯d had enough.¡±


    Mom snorted. ¡°You know, when he said he wanted to be a lawyer, I couldn¡¯t believe it at first. Even if he wasn¡¯t going to be a trial lawyer, I just could not imagine him¡­ defending a position. Without compromise. I mean, I presume compromise is still a large part of his job, but¡­ I guess I don¡¯t have to imagine any more.¡±


    ¡°No, I guess not.¡± Cassie straightened up. ¡°He probably swears less at work though.¡±


    ¡°Well I certainly hope so.¡±


    A new blackberry circlet was waiting in the dark on Cassie¡¯s desk when she ascended to her room, all but the faintest buzz of champagne worn off. She marveled at Rubus¡¯ stealth; she had only left the window open the barest sliver, and she had neither heard nor seen any hint of him all evening. Perhaps it really was a bird courier, or maybe a squirrel. Or¡ªif she were being honest¡ªmore likely, a rat. Cassie made sure to close her bedroom door softly before padding over to look.


    The new circlet was larger than the one hanging over the corner of her headboard, both in diameter and thickness of the interwoven strands. It was heavier, too. She wondered when she would have the chance to give it to Matt. After everything that had happened tonight, it might be a while. Cassie hung it over the spine of her gooseneck lamp, pushed the window open a little wider, and went to bed.


    When she awoke in the morning, there were two new drawings laid on her desk, corners tipping lazily, like the wings of a butterfly at rest, from an intermittent breeze threading in through the window. Cassie rolled out of bed to seize them eagerly before she was fully awake.


    One was an abstract watercolor experiment, daubs of ombre green and brown and black punctuated by fine-tip pen and negative space, with the barest hints of pink¡­ Cassie¡¯s sleepy eyes focused, and a blush crept across her face. It wasn¡¯t abstract; it was an impression of her, as seen from above, naked among the leaves and exuding an air of supreme relaxation and contentment. Cassie set it aside to hide with the others¡ªit was about as subtle as The Ecstasy of St. Theresa¡ªwondering how many attempts it had taken Rubus to be satisfied with the results, and turned to the next work of art.


    It was a graphite drawing of Matt, fists clenched on the table, yelling at Tyler, as seen through the kitchen door. Cassie picked it up in surprise and admired the force of it; it had clearly been hastily sketched to capture the scene before receiving later refinement from eraser and smudger. Scribbled below, the handwriting clumsy but determined: Matthew Harris. Tyler Harris. And little arrows connecting each name to its owner. Cassie laughed out loud.


    She moved to set the drawing on top of the watercolor, then hesitated. Instead, she put the watercolor away by itself and rested the pencil sketch against the base of the lamp, under Matt¡¯s blackberry circlet. Then she turned away, opened her laptop, and, after one final read-through, quit her job.


    Well, put in her notice, at least. She couldn¡¯t just leave her labmates in the lurch. But she still felt lighter. Cassie spent the rest of the morning shopping online for a new pair of hiking boots.


    Lunch was leftover cheese and apple cake, followed by plant care arrangement: texts to her neighbor requesting a refill of her automated watering system for the short-term, and working out an adoption plan with Mom for the long. As expected, Mom agreed to take them all, sight unseen; Cassie had to remind her it might depend on the available space in her new apartment. ¡°Oh I¡¯m sure I can work it out,¡± came the reply. Cassie didn¡¯t argue; another stake in the ground for a nicer apartment was not something she would object to, in case Tyler pushed again.


    Tyler was late for dinner. Cassie didn¡¯t realize he was the one who had parked outside until the front door slammed open and he stomped in; it was a different car. Mom did the same double-take as she straightened up from pouring batter into the muffin pan. ¡°What happened to your car?¡± she asked.


    ¡°In the shop,¡± Tyler muttered repressively, and attacked the plate of spaghetti Mom had left for him on the table. Cassie reminded herself yet again that, no matter how unpleasant Tyler became, she needed to stay and advocate on Mom¡¯s behalf. Matt wasn¡¯t here. She was glad she¡¯d already eaten, because Tyler¡¯s furious meatball assault was truly offputting. She scrolled around on her phone to keep from having to watch.


    ¡°So.¡± Cassie looked up. Tyler took a long drink of water and made a visible attempt to compose himself. A baby sock statically clung to the underside of his right sleeve. Cassie wondered if it had been there all day, and felt a rare pang of compassion. Three kids, going on five. Jesus.


    ¡°So,¡± he said again, sounding calmer. ¡°We¡¯ve got two big things left to do before we put the house on the market: the inspection and the hardscaping...¡± Tyler launched into an explanation of the inspection that Cassie was fairly sure Mom already knew, but she held her tongue. If they made it through this evening with nothing worse than a little mansplaining, she¡¯d count it a success. The inspector would come by the next day; it all sounded unremarkable and aboveboard. Just as Tyler moved on to the hardscaping and Mom pulled the muffins out of the oven, Cassie¡¯s phone buzzed: Caller Unknown.


    Cassie hesitated. She did not want to leave her mother defenseless, but she was expecting a call from the American Society of Plant Biologists about her grant. It buzzed again. She could make this quick. Cassie scurried out to the living room. ¡°Hello?¡±


    ¡°Hello. We¡¯ve been trying to reach you regarding your car¡¯s extended warranty¨C¡±


    Stupid. Of course a federal institution wouldn¡¯t be calling this late. Cassie immediately hung up.


    When she returned to the kitchen, Tyler was wolfing down a blackberry muffin fresh from the oven while Mom chattered brightly about differentiating newborn twins with nail polish. Cassie had missed the entire conversation. It must have been very short.


    Tyler grunted heedless affirmatives to Mom¡¯s string of rhetorical inquiries around the too-hot muffin in his mouth while gathering himself to leave. When he caught sight of Cassie standing in the doorway, he paused. He swallowed his bite, very deliberately, and turned to their mother. ¡°This blackberry muffin is delicious, Mom, thank you,¡± he said clearly, an odd gleam in his eye. ¡°Mind if I take another one for the road?¡±


    ¡°Not at all, honey. Here, take two.¡±


    Tyler was obviously winding up for something, with all the subtlety of a rhino, but Cassie couldn¡¯t see what yet. She waited stoically for the other shoe to drop. He took the muffin bag from Mom and kissed her, then headed out the door.


    ¡°Last call for blackberries,¡± he shot. And then he was gone.


    Cassie stood rigidly in the doorway, suddenly cold. ¡°What about the blackberries?¡±


    ¡°Oh,¡± Mom said, setting the remaining muffins on a cooling rack, ¡°the hardscapers are going to put up a new fence at the correct property line, and they¡¯re removing that ugly old chain-link first. The whole blackberry bush has to come out; they¡¯ll be by in three days for that.¡±


    Cassie¡¯s stomach dropped into another universe, and there was a ringing in her ears. ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°Remember the surveyors? Apparently, the entire bramble is on our property here¡ªit needs to be removed to get the old fence out and the new one in.¡±


    ¡°No.¡± Cassie¡¯s voice sounded as far away as her stomach felt.


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, sweetheart. I know it¡¯s frustrating; we just spent all that effort trimming it.¡± When the anguished expression on Cassie¡¯s face didn¡¯t diminish, Mom frowned in confusion. ¡°Is¡ªis anything left of your old fort in there?¡± she asked hesitantly.


    Cassie couldn¡¯t breathe. ¡°I have to go.¡±


    ¡°Go?¡± Mom repeated, bewildered. ¡°Go where?¡±


    ¡°On a walk,¡± Cassie lied. ¡°I need to think.¡±


    ¡°At night?¡± Mom asked incredulously.


    But Cassie was already on her way out the front door.

 Chapter 15. Invasive Species

    Cassie had never actually entered the bramble from the other side of the fence.


    She¡¯d been past it innumerable times, flying a kite in the open gopher-holed expanse of the park grounds, or riding her bicycle along the boundary path, or occasionally in search of an escaped frisbee¡ªbut not in the dark. Still, even after all these years, she had no trouble finding her way to the parkland entrance; the sidewalk was well-lit by streetlights, and the bollards dividing asphalt from weedy dirt glimmered with retroreflectors.


    Her hurried walk turned into an anxious trot as soon as she crossed into the parkland; the waning moon cast just enough light for her to navigate the path. If her mother sat upstairs in a darkened room long enough for her eyes to adjust and stared out the window, she would see Cassie coming, but that was a risk Cassie felt she had little choice but to take. She¡¯d already done what destination obfuscation she could by taking the long way around.


    For a moment, Cassie worried that it wouldn¡¯t work from this direction, that she wouldn¡¯t be able to meet Rubus, that the vector of the miraculous only operated along one axis: between house and bramble. Maybe coming round this way was the equivalent of pulling the wardrobe away from the wall and trying to axe into Narnia from the backside. But Rubus was a being, not a place¡ªwasn¡¯t he? Did it matter?


    Before Cassie could further develop this line of thought, she saw him. She stumbled a little in her relief, and slowed to a walk. She was panting.


    Perhaps in deference to his neighborhood visibility, he appeared completely human. He was even wearing shoes. He strode to meet her, stopping abruptly a dozen paces away, looking as agitated as she felt. ¡°Cassie.¡± His eyes searched her face. ¡°Cassie, what¡¯s wrong?¡±


    ¡°This is as far as you can go, isn¡¯t it?¡± she blurted. It was not at all how Cassie had planned to open this conversation¡ªalthough she hadn¡¯t really had a plan. And it was relevant.


    ¡°Yes.¡± Rubus stood on the path before her, tense as the first time they¡¯d met. Cassie shivered.


    ¡°What happens if you try to go further?¡±


    ¡°I can¡¯t,¡± he said simply.


    She began to weep. Rubus looked stricken. ¡°Please,¡± he begged, ¡°come to me. Tell me what¡¯s wrong.¡±


    Cassie closed the distance between them at a run and grabbed his hands. ¡°Your bramble,¡± she cried, ¡°they¡¯re going to rip it out!¡± She was nearly blind with tears. ¡°They¡¯re going to kill you!¡±


    Rubus froze. The wind began to blow. ¡°When?¡± it whispered. ¡°When?¡±


    ¡°Three days!¡± Cassie strangled her shriek down to a whisper. The wind tugged at her hair, and a sound too low to hear rumbled beneath her feet. ¡°To build a fence. A new fence at the property line. I don¡¯t think I can prevent it; I might be able to delay them by claiming they¡¯ve got the wrong address, or canceling Tyler¡¯s order, but there¡¯s no permanent explanation I can give that doesn¡¯t end with me involuntarily committed, and then I won¡¯t be able to help at all.¡±


    Squinting against the wind, Cassie looked up into his face. His eyes were wide. Something roiled underground.


    ¡°I can¡¯t stop them,¡± he said. His voice was the crackling thunder of a tree falling to the forest floor, and his hair whipped in the wind. ¡°They¡¯ll come with chainsaws and chemicals; I¡¯ve seen it happen to other plants. They cut the cane to the ground and rend the roots with rotary claws, then poison the rhizomes and raw earth left behind. A child with a ball, a man with shears, I can fight. But not this.¡± He grabbed Cassie¡¯s shoulders, eyes wild. The ground trembled. ¡°Cassie, I cannot stop them.¡±


    His grip on her shoulders was so fierce it hurt, but Cassie didn¡¯t care. She reached up and placed her hands on either side of his face. Thorns pricked her fingers but she didn¡¯t let go. ¡°I¡¯m going to get you out,¡± she vowed.


    ¡°How?¡± The ground quaked again.


    There was only one way. ¡°I¡¯m going to transplant you.¡±


    ?


    The light was broken in the garage, so Cassie worked by the dazzling pinprick of her phone propped against a can of paint. Quietly, so as not to wake her mother, she shuffled the few plant containers she could find into a row. Almost everything her mother had was already in use. This wouldn¡¯t be enough.


    Cassie turned to the shadow lurking between a rickety wire-rack shelf draped in a deflated six-foot Christmas lawn snowman and a bicycle with a torn seat cover. ¡°How big were you when you first became aware¡ªwhen you recall your first memory?¡±


    ¡°Larger than what this can hold,¡± Rubus replied flatly, not bothering to step into the light. Cassie couldn¡¯t even see his eyes.


    She bit fretfully at a hangnail. There was no time to go to a store. They had to start tonight.


    ¡°Wait here.¡±


    Cassie raced inside silently and wrenched open the cabinet under the sink. There it was: the Bag of Bags. Several Bags of Bags, in fact, stuffed firmly against the piping like crinkling plastic polyps. Their time had come at last. Cassie excised them and carried them back into the garage.


    ¡°Here,¡± she said, handing one wad to Rubus, ¡°pick out all the thick-plastic ones¡ªmost of those should have the little arrow-triangle ¡®recycle¡¯ symbol on them¡ªand triple-bag them. Toss the flimsy ones, they¡¯ll break with the weight of the soil.¡± A short while later, a cluster of semi-rigid bag containers listed around the short line of plant containers like a ghostly armada. Cassie looked at Rubus hopefully, desperately. ¡°Is this enough?¡±


    Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.


    He crouched over his last bag, pinching the plastic between his long fingers. ¡°Will it all fit in your car?¡±


    ¡°Yes. Barely. It¡¯ll be tight.¡± It wouldn¡¯t be the first time Cassie had driven with a plant on her lap, if necessary.


    ¡°Then we¡¯ll have to try.¡± He stood, rising out of silhouette and into shadow.


    ¡°I could rent a truck¡­¡±


    ¡°No.¡± Rubus¡¯ voice was brittle. ¡°Either this is enough, or nothing is.¡±


    Cassie couldn¡¯t see his face, but in none of her memories could she recall him sounding like this; hollow and splintering. ¡°The tumbleweed traveled hundred of miles,¡± Cassie said, unsure if she was trying to reassure Rubus or herself. ¡°Even the ficus moved in her pot.¡±


    ¡°I am not a tumbleweed. Or a ficus.¡±


    Cassie turned to Rubus and actually seized him by his shirt. ¡°No,¡± she agreed fiercely, ¡°You are Rubus armeniacus, the Armenian blackberry. You are an invasive species. Your kind escaped from cultivation and established themselves so thoroughly in this part of the country you will never be removable. I am going to plant you on a sunny hill by a stream with... birds, and... raccoons, and... and acres of space to grow.¡±


    Rubus lifted Cassie¡¯s hands, still fisted around the thin cloth of his shirt, to his lips and pressed them there for a long moment. The pale white light of Cassie¡¯s phone glinted in his hair¡ªthorns or curls, Cassie couldn¡¯t tell. ¡°Is this place far away?¡± he asked finally, mouth moving against her knuckles.


    ¡°No. There are many places like that. I¡¯ll be surveying a lot of them for my fieldwork.¡±


    ¡°Will it take long to get there?¡±


    He¡¯d never been in a car¡ªnever gone faster than a run or further than the range of his bramble. He had no tumbling wanderlust, only a need to grow and fruit. He must be in pure existential terror. ¡°No,¡± Cassie replied. ¡°Maybe half an hour. The trickiest part is going to be car accessibility.¡±


    Rubus nodded against her hands but said nothing. Cassie took a deep breath. ¡°Let¡¯s get started.¡±


    They worked until dawn. Crouched together in the bower, close as always, but this time scooping great mounds of dirt into the ersatz containers, Cassie with a trowel, Rubus with his hands. It was hard to see exactly how he did it; he seemed to simply plunge his fingers into the soil, as though it offered no resistance, and then sank in up to his bony wrists, before raising his hands up again with a massive clump of dirt held fast between them. Startled earthworms coiled wetly in the mass; Rubus murmured to them apologetically as he lowered the dirt into each bag.


    Cassie¡¯s efforts were puny by contrast, chipping away at the dense earth with the tiny trowel. She filled perhaps one bag for every four of Rubus¡¯. By the time they were finished, a rough crater existed where once the soft duff lay. Cassie wanted to cry, with loss and fear and exhaustion, but she swallowed her tears for Rubus¡¯ sake. Whatever she felt couldn¡¯t compare to what he must be going through.


    ¡°You can begin?¡± she asked hoarsely, smearing dirt across her cheek as she pulled a strand of hair from her eye.


    ¡°Yes.¡± Rubus stood looking down at the array of bags in the weak gray light that had just begun to filter through the bramble, face grave. ¡°I will begin propagating.¡±


    Cassie nodded. ¡°I need to sleep, but once I wake up I can get you some fertilizer, if you think it won¡¯t burn.¡±


    Rubus shook his head. ¡°This is my soil,¡± he said quietly. ¡°I don¡¯t need fertilizer.¡±


    ¡°Do you need to sleep too?¡±


    ¡°No. Not yet. After the propagation, yes.¡±


    Cassie nodded again and pulled off her gloves wearily. ¡°I should go in before anybody else wakes up. I¡¯ll come out and check on you later.¡± As she turned to go, a thorn caught gently at her sleeve. A moment later, she felt Rubus¡¯ fingers brush her arm. ¡°Cassie¡­¡±


    Cassie turned and buried her face in Rubus¡¯ shoulder. He wrapped his arms around her and nosed her hair. ¡°I¡¯m sorry,¡± she choked. ¡°I should have told you earlier about selling the house¡­ I didn¡¯t think they¡¯d kill you for it¡­ I thought you¡¯d still be here, safe, and I could come visit¡­¡±


    Rubus waited until she stopped talking. ¡°You don¡¯t need to apologize,¡± he said softly. ¡°You are saving me. I love you.¡±


    Cassie¡¯s heart stopped. He loved her. He loved her. She already knew that, of course¡ªit was obvious¡ªbut did she love him? How on Earth would she know? There was no definitive criteria for such a thing. She didn¡¯t think she¡¯d ever loved before, romantically speaking. Never been in love. She¡¯d had a few boyfriends throughout the years, and she¡¯d certainly had feelings for them¡ªwhat she could characterize as a deep fondness, an abiding concern for their happiness and wellbeing, something to mourn with tears and creature comforts when it ended. But love, the way other people talked about it, where they could think of nothing else, where it drove them to do crazy things, risk their lives¡ªnever.


    Surrounded by grocery bags filled with dirt, holding tight to a fantastical being, she could easily be mistaken for crazy. But she wasn¡¯t actually: she was operating as logically as possible under highly unusual circumstances. So she didn¡¯t know. Didn¡¯t know if she was in love, didn¡¯t know what to say to Rubus, didn¡¯t know how to leave and go to bed without addressing his statement somehow.


    Something rustled at her feet. Cassie started and looked down. All around her, the bramble was alive with subtle motion and the stretching whisper of accelerated growth. Canes bowed, arching low as they searched for a bag to bury themselves in. The disturbed patch of earth in which they stood seethed as rhizomes broke the surface, knobbly and pale, and followed the canes into the bags, trailing hair-fine rootlets as they went.


    Cassie would have bent over to watch the process more closely, fascinated, but Rubus still held her, rigid as a tree. His breath was shallow and irregular, and his fingers clutched at her back and hair. She looked up into eyes burning so brightly they cast shadows across his face and made the thorns in his hair glint green. His pupils were invisible. Cassie closed her own eyes and rested her head against his chest, circling her arms around him in turn, Baucis to his Philemon.


    They stood entwined as the propagation susurrus surged, peaked, and abated. When at last all was quiet, Rubus breathed a long exhale and released Cassie from his grip. She held him as he sank to the earth.


    ¡°Are you all right?¡± she asked, hands fluttering nervously around his face and shoulders.


    He nodded wearily. ¡°Just tired.¡±


    ¡°Do you need anything? Water?¡±


    ¡°No,¡± he whispered. ¡°Rest. Just rest.¡± He opened his eyes for a brief moment; they were dull as the dirt he sat on. ¡°I have to go now. You won¡¯t see me, but I¡¯ll still be here. Rooting.¡±


    ¡°I understand.¡± Cassie kissed his brow and stepped back. Rubus sighed again, and for a moment, there was only a dappling of dawn light and shadow that looked like a man where he had lain.


    Then there was nothing.

 Chapter 16. The Inspection

    ¡°Cass!¡± her mother called. ¡°The inspector is here! Are you decent?¡±


    Cassie sat up groggily. ¡°No!¡± she ground out, voice hoarse with sleep. ¡°Gimme a second!¡±


    No time for a shower. Cassie threw on whatever was at hand, double-checked that the incriminating artwork was fully buried in her suitcase, and padded out of her room.


    The inspector was already in the living room; he waved merrily as soon as he saw her peering over the banister. She waved back and slouched down the stairs to make the strongest possible coffee, then nursed it blearily as the inspector went about his inspection.


    Inside and outside, turning faucets on and off, down under the deck and up into the attic, taking notes on his clipboard checklist and taking pictures with his phone. She made sure to keep out of his way in the kitchen as she munched on a bagel, and kept an eye on the backyard to make sure he didn¡¯t stray too far from the house, but he never so much as looked at the bramble.


    He came back in to the kitchen at last, looking troubled. Mom ushered him to a seat and pressed a bottle of water into his hands while he flipped through his notes. ¡°Ma¡¯am,¡± he said gravely, ¡°I¡¯m afraid I have bad news.¡±


    ¡°Oh dear.¡±


    ¡°You have a mold problem.¡±


    Mom wrung her hands. ¡°Where? The bathroom¡­?¡±


    ¡°Well¡­¡± The inspector pulled off his hat and scratched hesitantly at his thinning hair. ¡°Everywhere. To be honest, ma¡¯am, this is one of the worst cases I¡¯ve ever personally seen.¡±


    Mom was speechless. Even Cassie was momentarily shocked. ¡°I¡¯ve never seen so much as a speck of mold,¡± she said, somewhat defensively. ¡°Mom cleans everything.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s everywhere you can¡¯t clean,¡± the inspector replied. ¡°In the walls, under the carpets. I pulled back a few sections to show you. Looks like you¡¯ve had quite a few leaks in the pipes over the years keeping everything nice and moist.¡±


    Cassie thought in muted horror of all the bangs and drips that served as the soundtrack to every shower she¡¯d ever taken in the house. Hell, she¡¯d cranked up the pressure to fight for her share when somebody flushed a toilet or ran the dishwasher.


    Mom looked devastated. ¡°Is it black mold?¡±


    ¡°Doesn¡¯t look like you¡¯ve got any toxic mold, fortunately¡ªbut you¡¯ll need a professional in to check. No health problems, right? Rashes, persistent coughs, that sort of thing?¡± Mom and Cassie both shook their heads. ¡°You should be in the clear, then. But even non-toxic mold is a major problem. It¡¯ll need to be dealt with, either by you before selling the house, or the new owners before they move in, after you¡¯ve knocked down the cost to match.¡±


    ¡°Oh my goodness gracious,¡± Mom lamented, still wringing her hands. ¡°How much will that cost?¡±


    ¡°Well¡­¡± The inspector scratched his head again. ¡°Like I said, you¡¯ll need to contact a professional about this, but¡­ something this big¡­ you¡¯re looking at tens of thousands of dollars.¡± He sounded very apologetic.


    ¡°Tens of thousands of dollars!¡± Mom repeated, aghast.


    Cassie felt a very strange emotion grab ahold of her, driving her to say, in a calm voice: ¡°Sounds like it could be as much as a sixth of the value of the house.¡±


    ¡°Could be, could be.¡± He put his cap back on his head. ¡°I¡¯m sorry to be the bearer of such bad news. I want to say ¡®everything else looks fine,¡¯ in terms of electrical and so on, but¡­¡± He shrugged helplessly.


    ¡°Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln,¡± Cassie muttered, still feeling strange, ¡°how was the play?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll get this all typed up for you and send you the report, with pictures,¡± the inspector said. ¡°Your son made it sound like you were in a hurry to get selling, so I¡¯ll be sure to get it done tonight.¡±


    ¡°I¡ªyes¡ªthanks,¡± Mom said distractedly. ¡°Thank you. Sorry for the trouble.¡±


    ¡°Oh, no trouble, ma¡¯am, it¡¯s my job. I just wish I didn¡¯t have to be the bearer of such bad news.¡±


    Mom called Matt as soon as the inspector left. He agreed to come over as soon as he could, which wouldn¡¯t be until tomorrow, but he promised to review the report in detail and look into mold removal. Cassie barely attended to the half of the conversation she could hear; she was still tired, despite the coffee, and it was all background noise as she stared out the window, straining to see if the bramble looked any different: any thinner, or more packaged for travel. It did not.


    It reminded her of waiting to get the details on Dad¡¯s initial diagnosis. There was nothing she could do but wait and hope that things beyond her control were turning out well. Rubus could propagate himself better than she ever could.


    Cassie hated it. She decided the best course of action was to go take a nap.


    Mom was still there when Cassie awoke after lunch, so she claimed the need for another walk and took the long way around to the bramble again. She brought a sleeve of cookies with her, eating a couple as she went. She could hear the discordant shrieks of children and the old merry-go-round they rode from the playground in the distance. Other than that, and the occasional road noise or birdcall, all was quiet.


    There was no sign of Rubus as she approached, nor any sign of how to enter the bramble from this side. She stood and considered it for a moment, chewing on her lip, before kneeling down and leaving the sleeve of cookies as far into the bramble as she could reach.


    Nothing happened.


    The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    Cassie turned and walked slowly back.


    Two days. This had to work in two days.


    Cassie had a great deal of trouble keeping herself occupied the rest of that day, and the next. She listed Beanie Babies on eBay. She comparison-shopped for camping accouterments. She helped Mom with whatever tasks she could think of: looking for a new apartment, taking a load of old clothes to Goodwill, sorting through cookbooks. She even scrubbed the oven. And always, she thought of the bramble. She glanced at it out of every backyard-facing window. Its weight loomed on her mind. Was the rooting going all right? Was the lack of drainage through plastic bags going to be a problem, even for this short a time? Did he want milk with his cookies?


    Matt¡¯s arrival came as a relief, though he looked grim. He said little until they were all seated around the dinner table, then poked at his salad with his fork and took a deep breath. ¡°I read through the inspector¡¯s report. He took pictures, too. I¡¯m not a mold expert, but he has no credible cause to falsely characterize how bad it is. I called a few mold removal contractors today, and they concurred with his estimates: this job is going to cost tens of thousands of dollars.¡±


    Mom looked more resigned now than horrified. ¡°What do we do?¡±


    ¡°Well,¡± Matt replied, ¡°we can delay the sale of the house¡ªprobably by a few months¡ªand spend our own time and money to fix the problem. Or, we can list the house as-is now for a commensurately lower price.¡±


    ¡°Which one should we choose?¡±


    ¡°It depends. Ultimately, it¡¯s up to you, Mom.¡±


    Mom fidgeted. ¡°I just want to do what¡¯s best. What do you think is best?¡±


    Cassie listened silently as Matt enumerated the pros and cons of each option, picking her way slowly through salad and lasagna. Eventually, the conversation worked itself around to where she knew it would eventually, though she had been hoping somehow it wouldn¡¯t: ¡°What does Tyler think?¡±


    Matt sighed explosively and flung up his hands. ¡°I forwarded him the inspector¡¯s report, but I don¡¯t think he¡¯s read it. He didn¡¯t bother to respond at all, let alone with anything indicating he understands what this means for him.¡±


    Mom frowned. ¡°¡®What this means for him¡¯... What do you mean?¡±


    Matt and Cassie exchanged a look. ¡°He had me rewrite the entire agreement to lock each of us into a flat cash value from the sale of the house,¡± he explained slowly, ¡°and he¡¯d pick up the remainder. He thought the remainder was going to be bigger than the one sixth he would otherwise have received. But it¡¯s not. In fact, he¡¯s going to be lucky if he gets anything at all.¡±


    ¡°Oh!¡± Mom cried. Her hands flew to her face. ¡°Oh, we should call him right away!¡±


    Matt sighed again, less explosively, and pulled out his phone. Then he hesitated. ¡°Mom, maybe you should call him.¡±


    ¡°My phone¡¯s on the charger, honey, I¡¯m sure it will be fine.¡± She waved her hands at him: go, go.


    Matt made an if you insist face and dialed, then set the phone in the center of the table on speaker mode. It went to voicemail.


    ¡°Call again,¡± Mom urged, standing to clear the dishes from the table. ¡°He¡¯ll know it¡¯s important.¡± Matt obliged. This time, Tyler picked up.


    ¡°What?¡± he snarled, over the sound of children shouting and a loud television show that seemed to feature slide whistles.


    ¡°Hey, Tyler, you¡¯re on sp¡ª¡±


    ¡°What do you want?¡± Tyler cut Matt off. Matt made a visible effort to calm himself before asking, ¡°Did you read the inspector¡¯s report?¡±


    ¡°Yeah,¡± he said shortly. ¡°Do you need my signature on something?¡±


    Cassie didn¡¯t believe Tyler had actually read it. From the look on Matt¡¯s face, neither did he. ¡°You read the whole thing?¡± he asked carefully.


    Tyler exploded. ¡°JESUS CHRIST!¡± Cassie could hear his wife snap, ¡°Language!¡± faintly before the background noise dropped significantly. It sounded as though Tyler had walked into a different room, or perhaps entirely outside of his house, before continuing his tirade. ¡°What the fuck, Matt, are you trying to be patronizing?¡±


    ¡°I just want to make sure we¡¯re all on the same page before we make a decision about putting the house on the market.¡±


    ¡°WHAT DECISION?¡± Tyler shouted with such volume that the phone vibrated on the table. ¡°There is no decision! Put the house on the market! Jesus fucking Christ! Why is this so fucking hard for you to understand?¡±


    Mom, who had returned to the table with a tray of blackberry muffins, opened her mouth angrily¡ªCassie could almost hear her thinking Is this how you talk to each other when I¡¯m not around?!¡ªbut Tyler stormed on. ¡°If I¡¯d been in charge this house would be sold already! What¡¯s the fucking holdup?¡±


    ¡°If we proceed immediately under the new disbursement agreement you had me draw up¡ª¡± Matt began.


    ¡°So that¡¯s what this is about.¡± Tyler¡¯s voice had gone from blistering rage to icy sneer. ¡°I¡¯m not interested in relitigating this with you, and it¡¯s Mom¡¯s decision anyway. As you are so fond of reminding me. Like she¡¯s ever made a real decision on her own.¡±


    Matt and Cassie¡¯s eyes flew to their mother¡¯s face. She had closed her mouth and was turning red. Cassie opened her own mouth to shout at Tyler¡ªcall him an asshole and make it abundantly clear that the object of his scorn had heard his barb¡ªbut Matt cut her off. ¡°Okay,¡± he said calmly. ¡°Well, you¡¯ve once again made yourself violently clear.¡±


    He glanced up at Mom again. She gave him a tight nod. ¡°We¡¯ll proceed with immediately putting the house on the market. Goodbye.¡± He hung up.


    There was a moment of silence. ¡°The college funds aren¡¯t impacted by the house sale at all, right?¡± Mom asked quietly.


    ¡°Not at all,¡± Matt confirmed. ¡°And you should have enough for discretionary spending on grandkids, as long as it¡¯s not extravagant.¡±


    ¡°Good.¡± Mom nodded and took a bite of muffin. ¡°Good.¡±


    ¡°Not that this matters,¡± Cassie said, ¡°but I wholeheartedly support your decision.¡±


    Mom smiled. ¡°You¡¯re right,¡± she said, ¡°it doesn¡¯t matter.¡±


    ?


    ¡°Matt, wait.¡±


    ¡°Yeah?¡± Matt looked up as he was pulling on his coat at the door, but didn¡¯t pause. Cassie had the distinct impression he was avoiding eye contact, but didn¡¯t let herself dwell on it as she said, ¡°I have something for you.¡± She was going to lose her nerve if she didn¡¯t do this quickly.


    He waited reluctantly.


    ¡°It¡¯s in my room,¡± Cassie clarified.


    Matt rubbed his face. ¡°Fine. Okay.¡± He plodded heavily up the stairs behind her, making her heart thump with every footfall, and pulled her bedroom door shut behind them. ¡°Here,¡± she said quietly, and gave him the sketch and the adult-sized blackberry circlet, one in each hand.


    Matt took them each in turn, face draining of color. ¡°Did you make these?¡± he croaked.


    Cassie shook her head. ¡°No,¡± she replied. ¡°He did. He wanted you to have them.¡±


    Matt stared at them as though they might suddenly combust, and his hands began to shake. He didn¡¯t say anything else. Cassie swallowed. ¡°Matt, I¡¯d like your help with something.¡±


    He looked up at her mutely, eyes wide. Then he looked back down at the circlet and the sketch and nodded, and finally managed to find his voice. ¡°Yes. Whatever you need. Anything.¡± And then he looked up at her, eyes shining. ¡°Thank you. Please¡­ please thank him for me. And tell him¡­ tell him I¡¯m sorry.¡±


    Cassie took a deep breath. ¡°You can tell him yourself tomorrow.¡±

 Chapter 17. Transplantation

    Matt texted Cassie from the backyard at midnight on the dot, as planned: I¡¯m here.


    Cassie looked out her bedroom window. Sure enough, she could see her brother lurking in the shadows at the base of the porch. She¡¯d turned off the porchlight earlier in the day, just after she¡¯d propped the side gate open and backed her car into the driveway. The car would probably make a racket when she tried to start it, but that couldn¡¯t be helped.


    Cassie was already fully dressed; all she did was put on her shoes before creeping out of the house and into the backyard.


    Matt was dressed all in black, complete with black work gloves that looked brand new, and had a headlamp already affixed to his forehead. His fleshy jaw was set with determination. Cassie, by contrast, was just in her normal field clothes: cargo pants and a t-shirt. She wished she had some in darker colors, but her wardrobe had been optimized over the years for sunshine comfort, not stealthy midnight plant heists.


    ¡°What do you need?¡± Matt whispered. Cassie gestured him over to the station wagon and popped the trunk, cringing as it shrieked rustily. ¡°I need to fit about two dozen plastic bags with blackberry plants in them in here,¡± Cassie whispered back. Matt shone his headlamp into the space; the dome light on the car had ceased working years ago.


    ¡°Will it fit?¡± he asked dubiously.


    ¡°We have to make it fit,¡± Cassie said. ¡°Put them in the back seat too, and on the floor. I can drive with one in my lap if needed.¡±


    Matt chewed on his lip before stuttering, ¡°W-w-where will¡ªdoes he need to¡ªsit? Does he need a seat?¡±


    Good question. ¡°I don¡¯t know,¡± Cassie muttered. ¡°We¡¯ll have to ask him.¡±


    Even in the dark, Matt looked terrified. ¡°Is he here?¡±


    Right on cue, a shadow emerged from the indistinct gloom of the nighttime yard. Cassie nodded over Matt¡¯s shoulder. He started and whirled around.


    Rubus stood in the faint, quavering light of Matt¡¯s headlamp, clad all in ragged black. His eyes looked bruised. Clasped in his sinewy hands was the missing garden gnome.


    He nodded cordially at Matt. ¡°Hello.¡±


    ¡°Hi.¡± Matt swallowed. ¡°It¡¯s nice to see you again.¡±


    ¡°You too,¡± replied Rubus quietly. There was a moment of profound and yawning awkwardness as nothing more was said.


    They didn¡¯t have time for this.


    Cassie cleared her throat, almost apologetically, and asked, ¡°Would you like to sit in the front?¡±


    Rubus looked at the car.


    ¡°The¡­ the bramble is going in the back,¡± Cassie explained. ¡°But you could sit up in the seat next to where I¡¯ll be driving. If you¡­ if you need a seat.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll try it,¡± Rubus said.


    Matt unnecessarily re-tightened his work gloves. ¡°Can we put the plants in one by one,¡± he asked nervously, ¡°or do we need to keep them clustered to within a certain radius?¡±


    Rubus looked back at the bramble for a moment, then at the car. ¡°One by one should be fine,¡± he said quietly. ¡°I¡¯ll let you know if¡­ it hurts.¡±


    ¡°Okay. Right. Okay.¡± Matt took a shaky breath. ¡°Good.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll get the bags out of the bramble,¡± Cassie said. ¡°Matt, you take them to the gate, then we can all pack the car together. Rubus, you¡­ let us know if you need anything.¡±


    ¡°Okay.¡± His voice was barely above a whisper. ¡°Thank you.¡±


    The bramble tunnel was sparse and brittle as Cassie walked through¡ªwalked, with only a slight crouch. Rubus had opened the channel, although whether it was due to ease-of-access intent or merely an incidental result of the propagation process, she wasn¡¯t sure. In the light of the borrowed headlamp, the leaves looked crumpled and yellow. A few fluttered to the ground as she brushed past, dry as a candy wrapper. Cassie could feel her pulse leap with anxiety, eased only somewhat as she entered the bower and saw the propagated canes, small but otherwise hale. She took them out one by one, cradling each bag to her pounding heart.


    Matt and Rubus were speaking softly to each other as Cassie brought the last bag out. ¡°¡ªresponsibility of the buyer,¡± Matt was saying. ¡°Presumably, it will delay any move-in date. The mold incursion is extensive.¡±


    Rubus nodded. ¡°I told Cassie, when I came for your father¡¯s funeral; the house is full of life.¡± He gestured at the house. ¡°There are quite a few mushrooms growing at the southwest corner of the foundation, as well. I think the cement may be crumbling.¡±


    Matt turned to look at Cassie, eyebrows raised.


    ¡°I thought he was being metaphorical,¡± Cassie said weakly.


    Matt made a dismissive it¡¯s-not-important-right-now motion with his gloved hand and took the bag carefully from her arms. ¡°Let¡¯s load the car.¡±


    Everything fit, barely. Cassie surveyed the bags, snugged so tightly against each other and the features of the car they had already begun to deform. At least she wouldn¡¯t have to worry about anything sliding around back there. Rubus¡¯ long legs turned out to be the tightest fit of all: without room to adjust the passenger seat backwards, he sat with his knees crooked at a sharp angle, shins touching the glove box. He sat rigidly in his seat, like a first-time patient at the dentist, clutching the garden gnome to himself and staring straight ahead unblinkingly as Cassie buckled him in. When Cassie asked him if he was comfortable, he just nodded tightly and kept staring.


    Matt peered in through the driver¡¯s side window. ¡°We good?¡±


    ¡°As long as my car starts,¡± Cassie said grimly, and twisted the key in the ignition. The engine spluttered to life on the first try. A good omen. Matt patted the roof of Cassie¡¯s car and hurried to his own as she rolled out of the driveway and drove up the street. His headlights flared to life as he followed.


    They drove in tense silence. Cassie kept casting glances at Rubus every few minutes; he held the gnome so tightly she was worried it might shatter. She wondered if she ought to keep him engaged in conversation, like a concussion patient at risk of slipping into a coma, but her mouth was dry and her hands were wet and she was having enough trouble keeping her mind on the road in the dark as it was, so she held her tongue.


    A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.


    Rubus was the one to break the silence, just as they pulled onto the highway. ¡°Cassie,¡± he said faintly.


    ¡°Yes?¡± Cassie kept her eyes on the on-ramp.


    ¡°I¡­¡±


    There was a soft thump and a zip. Cassie jerked her head around to look, momentarily wobbling the car between two lanes, and her throat seized with horror.


    The seatbelt had retracted flat. The gnome lay rocking gently on its side, alone on the seat.


    Rubus had disappeared.


    Biting back a sob, Cassie returned her focus to the road and floored the gas pedal. The engine roared asthmatically, resulting in a slight increase in speed. Matt effortlessly pulled alongside her on the right. He took one look in at her now-empty passenger seat and his eyes went wide. He dropped back to following position.


    It took an agonizing eternity to reach their off-ramp. Cassie barely reduced her speed as she rounded the bend onto the access road, and she completely blew through the flashing yellow light at the rural intersection. At this time of night, those were merely suggestions anyway¡ªand this was an emergency. Matt did the same.


    They flew over a set of railroad tracks with no regard for their suspension and barreled down the dirt road on the other side, jouncing violently, then skidded to a dusty halt in front of a chain-blocked fire road. Matt leaped out of his car and hauled a pair of bolt cutters from his back seat. Cassie could see the price tag still attached to the handle as he knelt by one of the posts in the dim yellow glow of her headlights. In a matter of seconds, he had snipped open the corroded old lock and stuffed it in his pocket. He pulled the chain across the road, and they were through.


    They had to go slowly now, or else risk their lives. The road was deeply pockmarked and rutted with rocks, and there was a sharp dropoff to one side. The two cars inched along, bouncing and jolting, until the road widened and dipped down to the edge of a stream. Cottonwood trees (Populus trichocarpa) threw sharp shadows onto each other as the cars rumbled to a stop. Cassie cut the engine.


    It was eerily quiet after the roar of engines and growl of tires over rough road. Cassie almost felt like she had plugs in her ears; the only sounds to make it through were the gentle trickle of the stream and the click of Matt¡¯s door as he hopped out. She did the same, with a decidedly louder screech of old hinges.


    ¡°Is he...?¡± Matt wrung his hands, looking for a moment like a large, hairy version of their mother.


    Cassie shook her head. ¡°I don¡¯t know,¡± she quavered. ¡°He may just be too tired to manifest. I don¡¯t know. But we¡¯d better get the bramble planted, quick.¡± Matt nodded and ran to the back of his car, pulling out two spades. Cassie wrenched her trunk open and touched one of the leaves tremulously. It felt healthy, but it was so small¡­ She left it there and joined her brother.


    He handed her one of the spades. ¡°You said you had a specific spot in mind, right?¡±


    ¡°Yeah, should be over this way. I hope I can recognize it in the dark.¡± She wished she had thought to ask Matt to buy another headlamp, but her phone light would have to suffice. She pushed through the underbrush and rock-hopped across the stream, then walked along for a few paces until she found a brook feeding into the stream and turned to follow it uphill. Matt lumbered behind. The two of them scrambled up the slope, panting, until they broke free into the faint moonlight of a clearing. Cassie tramped ahead through a patch of giant horsetail fern (Equisetum telmatiea) until the ground stopped feeling spongy, put her phone in her mouth, and stabbed the spade between her feet with both hands. Soft, but not soggy. Perfect.


    Cassie spat her phone back out and surveyed the rest of the clearing. Honestly, it was astonishing it hadn¡¯t already been colonized by a blackberry bramble of its own. She turned back to Matt, who was still catching his breath, and waved him over.


    ¡°This is the spot,¡± she said. ¡°It¡¯s gonna be a real bitch hauling the plants up here, but I think we need to do it in stages anyway, just to keep them clustered together. In case¡­ yeah.¡± Better to focus on the physical, so as not to get wrapped around the axle of the metaphysical. Cassie instructed Matt on how to pull up the existing plants and dig the holes, and the two of them set to work.


    ¡°This absolutely... looks like we¡¯re... disposing... of a body,¡± Matt grunted haltingly as he dug. ¡°Digging holes... in the wilderness... in the middle... of the night.¡± He paused to wipe his brow. ¡°I hope no missing persons cases happen in the vicinity anytime soon.¡±


    ¡°Good thing we¡¯ve got such a good lawyer.¡±


    ¡°I am definitely not that kind of lawyer.¡± He moved on to the next hole. ¡°I¡¯m glad I paid for these tools in cash.¡±


    ¡°We¡¯ll just say it was for my research. You¡¯d be surprised how readily the authorities accept that.¡± Cassie started another hole of her own. ¡°I¡¯d have a couple trespassing charges otherwise.¡±


    ¡°What were you actually doing?¡±


    ¡°Research,¡± Cassie said. ¡°I wasn¡¯t lying. Just trespassing.¡±


    They finished their holes and left the spades stuck into the earth, upright poles barely visible in the moonlight, to climb back down the hill and cross the stream to their cars, where they both chugged thirstily at their water bottles.


    What followed was an interminable Sisyphean slog of bag moving: first from car to stream, then across the stream, then up the hill, then over to the holes, never splitting the cluster apart by more than a backyard¡¯s length. Both were gasping and sweating through their clothes by the end¡ªat one point on their final trip up the hill, Matt paused to retch into a bush¡ªbut they never stopped moving for more than a moment. Too much was at stake. Were the little rooted bramblings wilting, or was it just Cassie¡¯s imagination? It had to be¡ªit took more than just a bit of a ride in a bag to phase Rubus armeniacus.


    Wearily, they de-bagged each transplanted sprout and levered it gently into its hole, scooping the displaced dirt back in around it and watering it with what was left in the canteens. Then they both stood back and waited.


    And waited.


    Cassie made a noise. ¡°Wait here a sec,¡± she said, unnecessarily. She trudged out of the clearing, slithered down the hill more on her butt than upright, and crossed the stream. She slipped on the last rock; her foot plunged into the stream and twisted at the bottom. Tears began to stream down her face¡ªtoo much, this was too much¡ªbut she kept quiet and hobbled onto the bank and over to her car. The gnome was still there in the front seat, bright colors dulled to grayscale in the dark. She took it and limped damply all the way back to Matt.


    ¡°You ok?¡± he asked.


    ¡°Twisted my ankle,¡± she grated, smudging away tears. ¡°Not too bad. It¡¯ll be fine.¡± She settled the gnome gently in the middle of the freshly-planted bramble patch. It was taller than most of the plants, and gazed across them possessively. Cassie hobbled back to the patch edge and dropped inelegantly down in the dirt. After only a moment of sitting, she slumped onto her back and cried.


    ¡°Do you need first aid?¡± Matt asked nervously.


    ¡°No!¡± She howled, although she probably did.  ¡°No, I need him to be alive!¡± Cassie was practically screaming; she rolled over and pressed her face to the dirt to muffle the volume. ¡°I just lost Dad, I can¡¯t lose him too! I just got him back, and it¡¯s my fault! I forgot! Like some kind of moron! And I wasn¡¯t a little kid, either, I was thirteen! Fucking thirteen! There were pictures and everything!¡± Her ranting didn¡¯t make sense, but Matt still sat down heavily at her back and patted her shoulder. Like a dog. Oddly, it did make her feel comforted, but feeling comforted just made her cry more.


    She sat up again once the tears slowed. She could feel dirt all over her face, but made no move to wipe it off. It smelled good.


    ¡°Do you actually think we should wait here for him to¡­ revive?¡± Matt ventured finally.


    ¡°No,¡± Cassie replied dully. ¡°No, I¡¯ll come back to check tomorrow. Today. Later.¡± She fished out her phone to see what time it was, but the battery had finally run out. Too much flashlight use. ¡°Let¡¯s go.¡± They gathered the spades and bundled the bags, misshapen and dirty, into one big crinkly lump, and made their careful way back down.


    The gnome watched them go with unseeing eyes.

 Chapter 18. See You Tomorrow

    It was the day she had picked his name.


    It was a close thing. She almost named him Figaro, after the cat from Pinocchio, and then Mefisto, after the cat from The Pet of the Met. Bagheera was a brief contender as well, for similar reasons. However, after giving it some more thought, she decided she hadn¡¯t quite given up on her hopes of him being a fairy. He needed a fairy name, but the only one she could think of was Tinkerbell, and that wouldn¡¯t do. So she consulted the font of wisdom, as soon as he walked in the door.


    ¡°Daddy, what can I name a fairy?¡±


    He caught on instantly. ¡°Does the fairy that lives in the bramble need a name?¡±


    ¡°Yeah.¡±


    ¡°Hm.¡± Her father shut the front door and set down his bag, then motioned her to the kitchen as he went to wash the smell of latex from his hands. ¡°Well, the two I can think of off the top of my head are Oberon and Titania. They are the king and queen of fairies. Is your fairy royalty?¡±


    Cassie thought of his ragged clothes. ¡°No. I think he¡¯s a peasant.¡±


    Dad laughed. ¡°A peasant! Well, there¡¯s always ¡®Puck¡¯ I suppose, but I¡¯m drawing a blank on the others. Give me a moment while I find my Shakespeare.¡±


    He hunted through the old books in the living room shelf until he found what he was looking for; a giant tome sandwiched between the Encyclopedia Britannica array and a photo album. He slid it out and rifled through the pages, muttering as he went:


    ¡°Not quite what I¡¯m looking for, but I suppose you could go with Caliban or Ariel¡ª¡±


    ¡°No, Daddy, Ariel is a mermaid¡¯s name.¡±


    ¡°Ah, my mistake. Okay, here we go: we¡¯ve got Peaseblossom, Cobweb, Moth, and Mustardseed. They¡¯re Queen Titania¡¯s fairy servants.¡±


    Cassie mulled these over. Neither Cobweb nor Moth sounded terribly appealing, but Peaseblossom and Mustardseed had potential.


    ¡°Maybe I could name him Black Berry. Like Black Beauty!¡±


    Dad chuckled nervously. ¡°Ah¡­ perhaps. Let¡¯s think about that. Hm. Tell you what¡ª¡± he reached out to the encyclopedias and pulled the second one from the shelf. ¡°Let¡¯s look up the Latin name.¡± He flipped through until he found the entry: ¡°Aha! Eubatus! How¡¯s that sound?¡±


    Cassie wrinkled her nose.


    ¡°Yeah, not great,¡± he agreed. ¡°Hang on a second¡ªlooks like Rubus is the genus name. How about that?¡±


    She didn¡¯t even have to consider it. ¡°Yes. I like that one.¡±


    ¡°Excellent, we have a winner!¡± Dad gave Cassie a high five and re-shelved the books. ¡°Let me know how he likes his new name.¡±


    ?


    Cassie was awakened by the sound of a chainsaw.


    She sat up and felt dirt crumble from her face and fall down her shirt. She shook it out absently as she hobbled to the window and squinted into the morning sunlight. The hardscaping crew had arrived and were already at work. There were ladders and tarps and some sort of wheelbarrow-sized cement roller. Snatches of music from a scuffed boombox were audible between the gasoline snarls of the chainsaw. Cassie watched bleakly for a moment before closing the curtains, climbing back into bed, and squishing the pillow over her head. There was no point to watching. It didn¡¯t matter anymore.


    There was a way to hike to the new bramble location without violating fire roads. Cassie took it that afternoon, parking at the trailhead like a law-abiding citizen and walking gingerly along the trail, favoring her sprained foot in its bulbous bandage. It took her over an hour to reach the spot, lovely and secluded. The plantlings looked shocked and out-of-place, as transplants do, but not otherwise distressed. The gnome still stood guard.


    There was no sign of Rubus.


    Cassie eased herself down next to the freshly planted patch and took off her pack.


    ¡°What a night,¡± she said conversationally, as though Rubus sat beside her and not a lifeless gnome. ¡°I bet Matt called in sick today. I would¡¯ve, if I had work.¡± She popped a couple ibuprofen and washed them down with a swig of water. ¡°I¡¯m going to have to go back to work myself, in a few days, just to close out and hand off my work for a couple weeks. Bereavement leave plus the last of my vacation is covering me till then¡ªguess I won¡¯t get much of a payout when I head out the door, but oh well. Time very well spent.¡± She rummaged around in her pack and pulled out a sleeve of cookies. ¡°I brought cookies; let me know if you¡¯d like one.¡±


    She munched in silence, watching a pair of moths dance around each other in the golden light. Whenever her chewing paused, she could hear the hum of assorted insects in the tall grass. A few confused roly-polies navigated the freshly-turned earth.


    ¡°Did you know roly-polies aren¡¯t actually insects?¡± Cassie asked. ¡°Too many legs. They¡¯re actually crustaceans, like lobsters or crabs. Tiny little land crustaceans.¡± She watched one tumble from a clot of dirt and reflexively armadillo itself into a little ball. ¡°Can¡¯t remember their Latin name.¡±


    She sat for a while longer, until the shadows crept into the clearing and the wind began to pick up, then flexed her ankle experimentally against its bandage and stood. ¡°I¡¯m going to pack out the wrapper, because I don¡¯t want it blowing away, but here¡¯s the rest of the cookies. Time to limp back to the car.¡± She hesitated for a moment, then kissed her fingers and touched them gently to a leaf. ¡°See you tomorrow.¡±


    Cassie returned home just as the light was fading, and made herself walk straight into the backyard. Haphazard furrows scarred the lawn where something large had been pulled through, and the entire rear of the yard was a gaping wound where once the fence and bramble had stood. It was a very pleasant and unimpeded view out to the parkland, but Cassie couldn¡¯t see beyond the rubble and absence. Most of the detritus had been hauled away already. A few blackberry leaves had been stomped into the dirt. Cassie peeled one up and examined it. It felt flimsy and dry, as though it had lain there for weeks rather than hours.


    She walked to where the bramble used to be and looked down at the chewed-up earth. A root grinder had been at work, gouging whatever it could reach, and some sort of white powder had been liberally applied throughout the trench. Herbicide. Cassie backed up a few steps. The new terrain was alien to her; she might as well have been standing on the moon.


    Her phone buzzed. Cassie pulled it out: a text from Matt. ¡°How¡¯s he doing?¡±


    ¡°Plants look healthy,¡± she thumbed back. ¡°No person though.¡±


    That became the refrain for the next few days: healthy plants, no person. She checked every afternoon, following the trail until she turned off to hobble through the green and golden wild, reaching the bramble patch and sitting down to share inanities and a snack: cookies, sandwiches, granola bars. She read aloud from biology articles on her phone, and showed him any memes funny enough to make her snort. On her last visit before going back to work, she brought a sketchpad and pencil.


    ¡°I¡¯m really out of practice,¡± Cassie grunted, setting the pad on her knees as she dropped to her butt. ¡°But I¡¯m hoping it¡¯s like riding a bike.¡± He probably had no idea what that meant. ¡°Never really forget once you learn how.¡±


    A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.


    She sketched a few dissatisfactory lines, muttered to herself, and flipped to a new page. Her next attempt was better. By the time she completed her third try, fog had started to blow in, obscuring the trees in wisps and tatters and making the paper stale with damp. Cassie tore it free from the pad, careful to keep aligned with the perforation, and tucked it under the base of the gnome, where it wouldn¡¯t blow away. ¡°There!¡± she said. ¡°Rubus armeniacus. Not too bad. See you in a couple weeks.¡±


    She was long gone by the time a slender green tendril reached tremulously for the drawing and drew it back into the bramble with thorns so new they were still pliant.


    ?


    The grasses were a drier gold but the maple leaves were all still green when Cassie returned, ankle healed and well-cushioned in her new hiking socks. Despite her best efforts to temper her hopes, it was still a crippling disappointment when she approached and saw no sign of Rubus corporeally standing there, only the wavering green of a bramble doing its best to climb in the absence of a trellis, humping up to the sun. The gnome was now only barely peeking out over a froth of leaves.


    ¡°You¡¯re looking good,¡± Cassie said by way of greeting, trying to convince herself. She had some success; the bramble growth did indeed look healthy. ¡°We gotta get you something to climb out here. No chain link available, but I¡¯m sure we can come up with something.¡± She set down her pack and shaded her eyes, looking around for inspiration. A bigleaf maple (Acer macrophyllum) sapling near the edge of the clearing had some nice springy twigs within arm¡¯s reach.


    Cassie took her knife¡ªnot her specimen knife, since that was in her field bag, just her camping knife¡ªwaded through the grass, and hesitated. What if this tree had a dryad? It was a young tree. It would be like cutting a child.


    ¡°Hey,¡± she said gently. ¡°Hey there, little maple. I need a few branches for my friend here, to help him get better. Um.¡± She was painfully aware that she sounded like she was asking for help petting the puppies in her windowless white van. ¡°I will only take a few. If this hurts, tell me to stop and I¡¯ll stop.¡±


    She cut four long, whippy switches free of the trunk, whispered a thank-you, and walked back to the bramble, pulling leaves off as she went. She toed her way carefully through the knee-high vines, moving slowly to avoid snags, and stuck the thick end of the maple switches into the ground as firmly as she could without breaking them, then bent them towards each other to form a crude trellis, tying them off with their own soft split bark. She retreated to the edge of the bramble patch and put her hands on her hips to survey her handiwork.


    ¡°Eh,¡± she said critically, ¡°not my finest work. But you¡¯re such a good climber it might not matter to you. I¡¯ll come back tomorrow to make sure it¡¯s still standing at least.¡± She knelt down and kissed a leaf directly before leaving this time.


    She stayed overnight with Mom. With Matt¡¯s help, she had downselected to two apartment finalists, neither of which was a rathole. Cassie tried to steer her mother towards making her own decision over dinner; the house was due to go on the market soon, and Realtor Linda was going to come by next week to advise them on room staging. The added pressure only made Mom dither more. Cassie gave up and settled on helping clear out the garage. She kept up even after Mom had gone to bed. It was midnight when she finally finished and tiptoed into the kitchen for a late snack.


    Mom had defrosted the remainder of the blackberries and used them to make scones. Cassie stared at them in the dim yellow of the range light, then looked out the window to the barren new fence outside. It still smelled like wood stain when you got close to it. Cassie looked back at the scones and tentatively took one, then gave it an experimental nibble. Nothing happened. She took a big bite, making sure to get a mouthful of blackberry; it was very good, but still nothing happened. She devoured the rest uncomfortably fast and waited, but all she felt was a burp. Nothing.


    Cassie climbed the stairs, lay down on her bed, and cried.


    ?


    ¡°Mom¡¯s finally picked an apartment.¡±


    ¡°Thank god.¡± Cassie rolled her cargo pants into a tight cigar and wedged them next to their comrades in her rucksack. ¡°The ground-floor one with the little garden?¡±


    ¡°Yeah.¡±


    ¡°Nice.¡±


    ¡°Yeah.¡± Matt¡¯s speakerphone voice petered out from the phone¡ªa new one, encased in the toughest, most water-proof case she could find. It was not doing the volume any favors. Cassie had stuck it speaker-end first into a You can¡¯t propagate plants if you haven¡¯t botany! mug to amplify it. ¡°So,¡± Matt continued hesitantly, ¡°no news, right?¡±


    Cassie expected the question and it still hurt. ¡°No,¡± she said, rolling up a pair of socks and stuffing them next to the pants. ¡°The bramble looks good¡ªgreat, actually, it¡¯s really taken to the trellis¡ªbut no¡­ nobody home.¡±


    ¡°Oh.¡± There was a mug-echoed crackle of static. ¡°I¡¯m sorry.¡±


    ¡°Me too.¡± Cassie started on another pair of socks. ¡°I¡¯ll check again when I come down to help Mom with the house¡¯s first day on the market this weekend, but after that, I¡­ my field work begins. It will be weeks before I can come back again.¡±


    ¡°Do you want me to check in periodically?¡±


    Cassie considered for a long moment, long enough to finish up the socks and move on to the underwear. ¡°I¡¯m starting to think,¡± she said, trying to sound crisp and clinical, ¡°it might be better not to keep waiting for the pot of water to boil. I¡¯ve checked at least once a week for¡­ many weeks, now. I don¡¯t think expanding the timeframe is necessarily a bad thing. I¡¯ll¡­ I¡¯ll tell him, so he doesn¡¯t wonder where I am.¡± Cassie stopped to wipe her eyes, so as not to spot her underpants with tears. So much for crisp and clinical.


    ¡°Okay,¡± was all Matt said, quietly.


    Cassie took a deep breath and cleared her throat. ¡°Any word from Tyler?¡±


    ¡°No.¡± Matt now sounded incredulous. ¡°I don¡¯t know what¡¯s preoccupying him, but he hasn¡¯t made a peep.¡±


    ¡°So he still has no idea¡­?¡±


    ¡°As far as I can tell, no.¡±


    ¡°He¡¯s going to have a hell of a shock this weekend.¡±


    Matt just sighed.


    ?


    Compared to transporting the blackberry, fitting all of her apartment plants into the car for a single delivery trip to the house was trivial. Mom greeted each one enthusiastically as she helped unload them into the kitchen, noting as she went where each might go in her new apartment. Outside sun for the rosemary and tomatoes, kitchen windowsill for the basil, mint, thyme, cilantro, and parsley. Mom lingered over each one rather than turn her attention back to her current task: folding the flyers to stuff into the clear box affixed to the FOR SALE sign hammered into the front lawn outside. Cassie did it for her while Mom fussed about transferring one of the tomatoes out of its pot and into a grow bag.


    Cassie¡¯s room had been staged for the open house. A lackluster arrangement of faux flowers bristled from a knobbly vase on her desk where the old lamp had been, next to an assortment of books pulled from the downstairs shelves whose only defining characteristic was that they all had green-toned covers. To match the walls, no doubt. Cassie didn¡¯t trust her ability to remake the bed adequately, so she slept on top of the covers under her coat. She dreamt of her field work, and was awakened by a scream.


    Cassie lurched from bed, heart pounding, before she was fully able to see, and wrenched open the bedroom door. The front door was open¡ªconcerning¡ªbut the scream had come from the kitchen. Cassie thundered down the stairs as Mom stumbled from her own bedroom in pursuit, breathlessly repeating, ¡°What was that? What was that?¡±


    Tyler was standing in the middle of the kitchen, trembling with fury, a flyer clutched in his shaking fists.


    ¡°What the fuck!¡± he screamed, and again: ¡°What the FUCK?¡± He turned his wild eyes to Cassie and jabbed his finger at the asking price of the house. ¡°What the FUCK is THIS?¡±


    ¡°Ah,¡± said Cassie.


    Mom joined them in the kitchen, fumbling on her glasses. Tyler turned his rage to her. ¡°Did you know about this?!¡±


    She didn¡¯t answer until she¡¯d had a moment to peer at what Tyler¡¯s unsteady finger was pointing at. ¡°Know about what?¡± she asked calmly.


    ¡°The PRICE!¡± Tyler howled. He was turning pink. ¡°The asking price for the house!¡±


    ¡°Of course,¡± Mom said, voice growing sharp. ¡°And I won¡¯t answer another question until you¡¯ve lowered your voice.¡±


    ¡°HOW¡ª¡± he bellowed, then took a deep breath. ¡°How is this¡ªhow could this possibly be¡ªthe asking price?¡±


    ¡°It is a fair value given the mold problem.¡±


    ¡°The MOLD PROBLEM?¡± Tyler roared, losing whatever minimal control he¡¯d momentarily commanded. ¡°What MOLD PROBLEM?¡±


    ¡°The one in the inspector¡¯s report Matt emailed about,¡± Cassie said. ¡°And called about. Repeatedly.¡±


    Tyler¡¯s mouth hung open, and his pink darkened to a lovely shade of magenta. ¡°The inspector¡¯s report,¡± he repeated hollowly.


    ¡°That¡¯s the one.¡±


    ¡°This¡ªthis¡ª¡± Tyler stuttered to a halt and shut his mouth. He looked down at the flyer again, and his face slowly drained of all color. Cassie and Mom stood and regarded him silently. ¡°I have to go,¡± he said finally, and, still holding the flyer, turned and walked out of the house. He didn¡¯t close the door on the way out, either.


    Mom let out a sigh. ¡°Well,¡± she said wearily, ¡°I suppose that¡¯s that.¡±


    Cassie bared her teeth in a grim smile. ¡°Think he learned his lesson?¡±


    Mom shook her head. ¡°I don¡¯t know,¡± she replied, walking to the front door to shut it behind her son, ¡°but there¡¯s certainly a moral to this story, isn¡¯t there?¡±

 Chapter 19. Quaking Aspen

    ¡°Welp,¡± Cassie said, approaching the blackberry bramble, ¡°Tyler¡¯s uppance has well and truly come.¡±


    There was no answer except for a slight breeze, but Cassie was still buoyed by the dark glow of schadenfreude. She picked her way carefully through the low thorny shrubs and crouched into the center of the trellis. There was only enough room for her to sit straddling the gnome, knees around its head, and the trellis was still open to the sky, but the tiny patch of ground on which she sat was dry and clear. She eased her pack into her hands and pulled out her sketchpad, then rested it on the gnome¡¯s hat to draw as she talked.


    ¡°He still doesn¡¯t have his big ol¡¯ dick-swinging car back from the ¡®shop¡¯¡ªI think it must have been leased, and he had to give it up. Pretty sure the beater he¡¯s driving now is a hand-me-down from his father-in-law. I mean, it¡¯s about ten times nicer than my car, but I bet it just eats at him.¡±


    The outline of a tree began to form under her pencil; she was drawing the view of the clearing she could see through the leaves. ¡°I do hope his wife and kids will be okay without the house sale money. It¡¯s not their fault their dad is a prick whose tastes exceed his finances. Matt thinks it¡¯s not dire, no gambling debts to a loan shark threatening to break his knees or anything, just¡­ he was expecting some big promotion and didn¡¯t get it. Due to the aforementioned prickishness. His wife might make him sleep on the couch for a few days, though,¡± Cassie added hopefully, as she sketched the outlines of the distant hills.


    She lapsed into silence for a while as she continued her drawing. She wasn¡¯t as good at landscapes, but it was good practice. A leaf brushed at the back of her neck; she leaned into it as she shaded a tree trunk.


    ¡°I have to go away for a while,¡± Cassie said, when the shadows grew too deep to draw well and she couldn¡¯t put the words off any longer. ¡°My fieldwork starts next week, and I¡¯ll be gone for a few months. Matt asked if he should come check on you, but we decided to just let you¡­ rest. Recuperate. But I will be back. I promise. I won¡¯t forget.¡± Cassie tore her sketch free and tucked it between two close canes, then leaned forward and pressed her mouth to a leaf. ¡°I promise.¡±


    She winced with the effort of crawling back out, joints stiff, and tried her best not to crush anything as she tottered her way out into the dusk. She didn¡¯t see that the leaf that had touched her neck had grown in the shape of a heart.


    ?


    The maples were vibrant with gold and orange, and Rubus still had not returned.


    Cassie stood in the clearing, tears leaving tracks of dirt and salt on her cheeks, and looked sightlessly at the bramble. She hadn¡¯t even stopped at Mom¡¯s new apartment yet; weeks of grime, barely tamed via a series of hasty sponge-baths, coated her neck and highlighted the lines of despair crinkled in her brow. The bramble was taller than ever, with a healthy, glossy green on every leaf.


    Where, then, was the dryad?


    Cassie couldn¡¯t bear to stay longer than the time it took to tuck a series of series of sketches she¡¯d made in the field under the base of the gnome: serviceberries (Amelanchier alnifolia) and salmonberries (Rubus spectabilis)--not the fruit, of course, nor the flowers, not at this time of year, but the leaves and stems. She nearly twisted her ankle again on the way back to the car, blinded by tears.


    Recriminations plagued her endlessly; through the drive, and dinner at the new apartment, and the long shower that followed, and on into a night on the pull-out couch that should have been a luxury after weeks in the sleeping bag but instead was spent staring at the blinking blue-edged shadows from the router light on the ceiling. She should have had Rubus re-root himself progressively further and further off the property and into the parkland while she stalled the hardscapers. She should have canceled the new fence build entirely. She should have told Mom the truth, and Tyler too, and presented Rubus as proof. She would have found a way to convince them somehow, with Matt to back her up, not to mention the dryad himself. Or at least just Mom, since Tyler might¡¯ve gone in some godawful destructive¡ªor exploitative¡ªdirection with that. Though Mom couldn¡¯t keep a secret for shit; Cassie had visions of the entire church congregation crowding into the backyard, gawking and praying and trampling the zucchini. Only a matter of time until one of them set it on fire, taking the house and neighborhood with it. But still¡ªsurely, there was something she could have done. Something other than what she had done.


    She returned the next day, but was too agitated to hold still. Instead of going in, she paced around the border of the bramble patch, reaching out to brush her fingers against a leaf every so often and talking about whatever came to mind: Mom¡¯s new apartment. The plants growing on Dad¡¯s grave. Tyler¡¯s imminent twins. Matt¡¯s latest date. The next step in her research.


    ¡°It may start snowing eventually, at some of my potential sample sites,¡± Cassie said. She stepped carefully over a rut to keep from rolling her ankle. ¡°Most of the sites should be too low-altitude or water-adjacent to get much real snow, but the ice and slush might make it a bit miserable. I¡¯m going to try and hit those up first and then retreat to the warmer areas after.¡± She paused to pull her hair out of her face, then resumed her pacing. ¡°I should stock up on those water-reheatable handwarmers.¡± She hated how inane she sounded. What even was the point? Who was she talking to?


    Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.


    ¡°I¡¯ll be away again for a while. You should be all right; it won¡¯t get any colder here than it did back at the house. Just¡­ let me know if you need anything.¡± She couldn¡¯t possibly have said anything more stupid, so she took a deep breath, cracked her knuckles, and turned away. ¡°See you soon.¡±


    The paper airplane crafted from her serviceberry sketch sat, unseen and forlorn, at the feet of the gnome.


    ?


    Cassie was halfway to her next sample site when it began to snow.


    It wasn¡¯t much, fortunately; just a light dusting. It melted as soon as it touched the ground. She tugged her hat down over her ears and resettled her rucksack, gazing across the valley towards her destination. It looked like it wasn¡¯t snowing there, fortunately; only up here, on the crest of a ridge, at an elevation too high to be attractive to her target subjects. Just a couple more hours and she should be there.


    A grove of quaking aspen (Populus tremuloides) spread across the descending slope, round golden leaves half-fallen to the ground below. The deer track Cassie was following threaded through the dense stand of trees, pale and identical. She paused and turned in a slow appreciative circle. This was a clone-grove, each tree a shoot from the same root system. She was standing within a single organism. Any one tree might only be a few years old, but the aggregate plant might have lived for centuries. Millenia, even. There was a clone-grove in Utah estimated to be eighty thousand years old. Like all sufficiently remarkable plants, it¨Che, actually since it was a hundred-acre stand of male aspen¨Chad a name: Pando, Latin for I spread. Pando the Quaking Giant. One of the greats, alongside the ancient bristlecone pines (Pinus longaeva) Prometheus and Methuselah, the gargantuan Bennett and Scofield junipers (Juniperus grandis), the towering coast redwoods (Sequoia sempervirens) Hyperion, Helios, and Icarus.


    I have a name.


    Cassie shivered. The snow flurry had ceased, but the wind had picked up, inducing the eponymous quake among the leaves that remained on the branches. The rush of a billion beatnik mice snapping their applause filled her ears. She slid her hat off to hear it better, even though her ears ached with cold.


    She was being watched.


    Cassie turned in another slow circle, peering intently into the grove. Other than the scintillating leaves, nothing moved. No birds, no creatures in the underbrush. She was totally alone¡ªbut the sensation persisted. She had felt it before. Either she was being watched or she was losing her mind.


    Cassie cleared her throat, then called softly: ¡°Hello?¡±


    There was no answer, but the wind died down. In the stillness that followed, Cassie felt like she could hear her own heartbeat.


    ¡°My name is Cassandra Nicole Harris. I am a botanist¡ªa scientist who studies plants.¡± She gazed vaguely into the middle distance, towards what she guessed was the center of the stand. ¡°Are you the dryad of this aspen grove?¡±


    Silence. The crunch of Cassie¡¯s feet on the fallen leaves as she shifted her weight was deafening.


    ¡°I don¡¯t know if I am the first human you have seen,¡± Cassie said, ¡°but you are not the first dryad I have seen. I know another; Rubus armeniacus, a blackberry.¡± Cassie swallowed. ¡°We are lovers.¡±


    A slight wind stirred the leaves, then stilled again. Coincidence? Or an intake of breath in surprise?


    ¡°He was going to be destroyed,¡± Cassie continued, ¡°dug up and poisoned like a weed. So we transplanted him, my brother and I. Months ago now. The bramble looks healthy, but his person¡ª¡± Cassie¡¯s voice hitched. ¡°He has not returned.¡±


    Another rustle of leaves. Sympathy? Horror? An inanimate shift of air pressure that indicated nothing beyond Cassie¡¯s own desperation?


    ¡°I don¡¯t know what to do. He has water, he has sun. The soil is good, and the weather is mild. He has a trellis, and his vines are growing on it. I talk to him, I bring him snacks and pictures, but he hasn¡¯t come back. I don¡¯t know what else to do. Can you help me?¡±


    More silence.


    ¡°Please¡­¡± Tears abruptly spilled from Cassie¡¯s eyes, but she forced herself not to crumple. ¡°Please. Help me. Tell me what to do.¡±


    They had tried to do so much for Dad. None of it had worked, but they had tried. Tried until it became clear that trying was worse than dying. And even then, dying took a long time. Longer than expected. He had the right to end it sooner, but they all knew that would break Mom¡¯s heart, so he hadn''t even considered it. Closed his eyes and looked away, half a head-shake, when Cassie had asked. But this wasn''t the same.


    ¡°Please,¡± she begged, voice a strangled whisper. ¡°I love him.¡±


    Cassie stood there a long time, tears cooling on her cheeks, listening to the breeze come and go. A bird twittered somewhere in the grove. Finally, when she could bear the ache in her ears no longer, Cassie moved. She put her hat back on and crunched away on numb feet, feeling insane. Out here talking at trees in the snow. She felt her face begin to flush. Even if there were any dryads in the vicinity, how and why would they understand any human languages, let alone English? And even if they did, how could they possibly know what intervention Rubus required? If some stranger ran up to her on the street begging for medical assistance for their boyfriend hundreds of miles away, she wouldn¡¯t have the slightest clue how to help.


    She did love him. Only love could make her this stupid.


    Cassie fixated on that as she stumped along, chanting silently to herself as she went: stupid love, stupid love, stupid love. Thank god nobody was here to see how red she was. She emerged from the grove and kept plodding grimly on as the wind picked up again, without looking back, until the deer track turned back on itself at the crest of another small rise and something caught her eye.


    Cassie looked up. At the edge of the grove stood a figure, tall and pale. The wind whipped a shapeless white cloak about her thin body; other than that, she was as still as the mountain beneath her roots. Cassie stared, then raised her arm in greeting. The dryad did not move. Cassie took a hesitant step forward¡ªand quick as a flicker of an aspen leaf, the dryad disappeared, no more than the play of shadows in the wind.

 Chapter 20. Rubus Armeniacus

    The next time Cassie came back to the bramble, it was the dead of winter and she was drunk.


    She hadn¡¯t driven drunk. She had driven sober, parked the car, and then gotten quite drunk by accident. At least she thought it was by accident. Matt had gifted her what was probably a very nice bottle of champagne at New Year¡¯s, and it had been rolling around on the floor of the car, clunking against one of her canteens, ever since. She¡¯d opened it on a whim in the parking area at the trailhead, exercising the corkscrew on her swiss army knife for the first time, intending to just take a few swigs before hiking up. Instead she¡¯d fallen into a bleak reverie and absent-mindedly finished half the bottle.


    She didn¡¯t even remember what it was that had so preoccupied her. Bottle in one hand, sketching supplies in the other, she trudged up the trail, thinking that it might be nice to share the champagne with Rubus, only to realize that: one, he¡¯d never had alcohol before, and he probably wouldn¡¯t like it, and: two, alcohol was not a recommended fluid for convalescing humans or plants. So instead, she finished it herself and tossed it into one of the few ramshackle trash bins maintained by the park service. Mustn¡¯t litter.


    Her head was spinning slightly by the time she headed off the trail and started staggering through the brush. By some miracle, she made it to the bramble without twisting her ankle, although she did fall down twice. She lost her kneaded eraser the second time. The bare branches of the maples rattled in the wind, counterpoint to the rush of the needles in the pines. She didn¡¯t see Rubus.


    She wasn¡¯t expecting to, though. Only hoping.


    Cassie waded clumsily into the bramble, even the lowest point now well above her waist, and ducked into the center. There was more room in there now, enough to lie down if she curled up; the trellis she made must have fallen and been swallowed by the cane. The gnome peeped out from the edge of the bower, half-hidden by leaves.


    ¡°I saw another dryad,¡± Cassie announced thickly. ¡°Quaking aspen, further north. Higher altitude. She wouldn¡¯t talk to me though. Very shy.¡± Lying down had made her queasy, so Cassie closed her eyes. It helped.


    Cassie was cold, but she was more sleepy than she was cold. Something tugged at her hair. She brushed it away. Her hair was pulled again, harder. Cassie swatted at it irritably and was met with a cluster of thorns that tore her skin.


    She yelped and sprang to a crouch, and immediately began to shiver violently. The sun had just set, and it was freezing. Literally freezing. There was frost near where she had been breathing on the ground.


    Cassie sucked in breath through chattering teeth and hurtled out of the bramble, sketchpad and pencils forgotten. The wind raked at her face, making her eyes tear up and spill over, and her lungs burned with cold, but she ran. Sprinted in bursts until she felt like she might vomit, then slowed to a jog, gasping through a throat so tight she wheezed. Her phone¡¯s light was barely enough to get her to the car, but she made it, and cried with relief when it started on the second try.


    She had almost died of exposure, drunk in a bush, like some kind of hobo.


    A hobotanist.


    Cassie started laughing hysterically. Stupid, stupid love.


    It took ten minutes of driving for the car heater to blast enough hot air to thaw her hands. Only then did the thorn-wounds sting.


    ?


    March was far too early for a flower. Mid to late April was what Cassie would expect, given the weather and general location, but there it was. A single flower, bobbing in the gusty wind. Highly unusual for a blackberry, which fruited in clusters. Cassie tucked her chilly fingers into her armpits and stared. What did it mean?


    When staring yielded no answers, Cassie ducked into the bower and set down her pack. No sign of the sketchbook and pencils she¡¯d dropped last time, but there was a thin layer of duff accreting on the ground. It kept her pants dry as she sat down and pulled out a new sketchbook and a bag of jerky. She chewed as she sketched, and did not speak. Today she had nothing to say.


    She drew the flower from memory: prickly bracts below, anthers crowning the filaments above, surrounded by five delicate petals. When she finished, she drew it again. And again. Her hand began to cramp, but still she drew the flowers¡ªthe single flower, over and over and over.


    As she finished each drawing, she tore it carefully from the sketchpad and set it aside. When the sketchpad was completely empty, and Cassie was surrounded by a pile of illustrated flowers, she lay down and stared at the small patches of pale blue sky she could see through the leaves above. No longer in danger of freezing to death in a drunken stupor, Cassie closed her eyes and dreamed.


    ?


    The boy was waiting for her when she came back the next day. She could see his eager form through the lattice of fence and leaves from halfway down the tunnel, still and bright-eyed. Cassie slipped through the gate and beamed up at him. ¡°I have a name for you!¡±


    She pulled a piece of paper out of her jumper pocket and held it out to him. He stared at it for a moment before reaching out and taking it in cupped hands, as though it were a moth.


    ¡°It says ¡®Rubus,¡¯¡± Cassie explained.


    ¡°Rubus,¡± whispered the wind, and then in an echo from the boy¡¯s mouth: ¡°Rubus.¡±


    ¡°Yes. See, these are the letters: R-U-B-U-S.¡± She pointed to each letter, penciled as neatly as her small fist could manage, as she spoke. ¡°Daddy helped me with the spelling.¡±


    He touched each letter in turn, as she had, then looked up.


    ¡°Do you like it?¡± Cassie asked. ¡°It¡¯s the name for ¡®blackberry¡¯ in Latin.¡±


    He looked startled for a moment, then smiled. ¡°Yes,¡± he said. ¡°I like my name very much.¡±


    ?


    Cassie was awakened by something flapping into her face: one of her own flower sketches. She pulled it from her cheek and sat up. Judging by the angle of the sun through the leaves, she hadn¡¯t been asleep long, but she felt as though she¡¯d been sleeping for hours. She grabbed her pencil and wrote on the back of the flower sketch:


    RUBUS


    She collected the sketches into a neat pile and laid the named one on top, writing-side up. Lord knew what he would make of the stack. She didn¡¯t know what she was doing, herself. Not anymore. She was operating on instinct; an overgrown bower-bird. Cassie set a rock down on top to act as a paperweight, then gathered up her pack and shuffled out of the bramble. She still hadn¡¯t spoken. All those words before, and now there was just nothing. Except:


    ¡°I love you.¡±


    And then she left.


    ?


    Cassie had everything she needed to spend the night in the bramble, but she couldn¡¯t get in because of the bees.


    She had already set her rucksack and sleeping bag down, but even without their bulk she couldn¡¯t get in. The bramble had exploded with flowers, and bees were gorging themselves.


    Cassie minced around the perimeter of the bramble¡ªit was large enough now that the circumnavigation took a minute¡ªbut there was no gap through which she could squeeze without risking a stinging. The bramble was bestrewn from all angles. She wasn¡¯t allergic, but still had no interest in being stung.


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    She put her hands on her hips. Perhaps she should just camp next to the bush? Or skip an overnight altogether; it wasn¡¯t quite peak sampling time yet, but getting a day¡¯s jump on the next leg of her fieldwork wouldn''t hurt. Or maybe she could wait till later, when the bees retired to their hive. It wouldn¡¯t be long till evening.


    Cassie sat down to wait.


    The bramble looked gargantuan from her seated vantage point. It was like being a child again, gazing into the engulfing wilderness of the thicket. Even the leaves and flowers seemed bigger. Perhaps it was the angle of the sun, but they almost seemed brighter, too. And there in the middle, wreathed by thorns, was a single blackberry.


    Cassie caught her breath. It must be the fruit of the early flower. She reached for it in a daze, and at her gentle touch it fell into her hand. It was perfectly ripe. She brought it to her mouth. Cassie didn¡¯t even have to chew; the blackberry melted on her tongue.


    She saw the tunnel then, just to the left and clear of bees. There was no hesitation; she threw herself forward and crawled, heedless of any rocks or cane that might slice her hands, but the path was smooth and spongy with duff. The thorns glided harmlessly over her skin.


    The further in she went, the higher the ceiling became. The sounds of open sky and field fell away, replaced by the rustle of creatures going about their business in the underbrush. By the time Cassie reached the bower, she was able to stand.


    There was nobody there.


    But it wasn¡¯t empty.


    There, in the middle of the duff, lay a single piece of paper, staked at each corner with a delicate rhizome sprout. They must have grown that way, four tender shoots finding their way through prepared holes before fanning out pale green leaves. Cassie fell to her knees, weeping with relief, with delight, with anguish, and dashed her tears away repeatedly, trying to see what was on the paper.


    She finally succeeded: it was a sketch of her, viewed from above, sitting cross-legged in the bower, surrounded by a pile of sketches, writing RUBUS on the paper in her hand. A drawing of her drawing him.


    Cassie looked up to the roof of the bower, as though she could see him there now, watching her, but all she could see through the renewed flood of tears was the green of leaf and blue of sky. She opened her mouth to say something¡ªPlease come back! Where are you? Why can¡¯t you be here? Is something wrong? What more can I do? I need you! I love you!¡ªbut all that came out was the last part, in a strangled whisper.


    ¡°I love you.¡±


    A low breeze rose, dying her tears, but then fell again into silence.


    Cassie crawled back out and brought her rucksack and sleeping bag into the bower, mindful of bees and thorns. There wasn¡¯t a lot of spare room, but there was enough to lay her sleeping bag down on one side of the staked drawing and her rucksack on the other. She curled up on the sleeping bag, eyes level with the sketch, and gently touched the sprouts. They felt pliant, but strong. Healthy new life. Sketches required hands, she thought, still tracing her fingers over the soft new leaves, and hands required a body, but she didn¡¯t know how tiring that was. Maybe he needed just a little longer.


    The sun slowly sank behind the trees, darkening the bower even as the sky outside remained twilit, but Cassie never turned on a flashlight. She simply lay there, eyes roving the bramble. She fell into a fitful sleep, still touching the closest sprout.


    She dreamed.


    ?


    ¡°I can¡¯t be the oak,¡± she laughed.


    ¡°Why not?¡± asked the boy. ¡°It¡¯s all a metaphor, anyway. A metaphor in a fable. You¡¯re the one who told me people can be things they aren¡¯t in fables with metaphors.¡±


    ¡°Yes,¡± Cassie replied, ¡°but I still don¡¯t see how that would work out. Metaphorically.¡±


    The boy considered this. ¡°All right,¡± he said finally. ¡°In that case, you should be yourself. I will be the oak.¡±


    ?


    Cassie woke abruptly. The smell of fertile decay was thick in her nose, so strong it was nearly suffocating. She sat up, breathing heavily. Was that a noise outside the bramble? She tried to quiet her breath to listen, but now all she could hear was the thundering of her heart. No good. She eased out of her sleeping bag as silently as she could manage and crawled out.


    The air was fresher outside, but colder. Cassie shivered and looked up at the moonless sky. The constellations were ones she didn¡¯t usually see directly overhead; it was very late. Early, in fact. She took a few aimless steps away from the bramble, hands reaching out to brush the tips of the long grasses as she passed, and peered into the night. Even without moonlight, the stars were bright enough to cast the clearing in a faint silver light. Nothing moved.


    She let out a slow breath and put her face in her hands. For a long moment she stood there, mind as empty as the dark behind her fingers, until a breeze rose and stirred her hair.


    ¡°Cassie,¡± it whispered.


    She turned.


    The stars shone upon the blackberry bramble and the dryad who stood beside it.


    ¡°Cassie,¡± he said again.


    She cried out and in two steps she was upon him, hands in his hair, heedless of the thorns, crushing her mouth to his. He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her off her feet, returning her kiss.


    ¡°You¡¯re alive,¡± she sobbed, when she finally broke away. ¡°You¡¯re alive.¡±


    ¡°Yes,¡± he agreed, pressing her to his chest. ¡°I am alive.¡± He radiated the residual heat of sun-soaked stone after sunset. He took her hands and backed slowly into the bramble. It moved out of the way to draw them both in, undulating closed again behind them with a whisper of leaves and cane.


    He lay her down in the bower, so gently it was as if the world were tipping to meet her instead. Dry-eyed now, she could see the stars peeping through the gaps in the bramble overhead, winking in and out as the leaves wavered in the nighttime breeze. His breath trembled on her lips as he kissed her, softly this time, almost nervously, as though she were the one who¡¯d nearly died, not he.


    Cassie closed her eyes and reached for him, touched his skin and bones and leaves and thorns, felt a thousand sproutlings return the caress as they denuded her, goosebumps quelled with a single warm pass of his hand. She worried for an instant that she might be dreaming, and nearly floundered up in a panic, but he was there above her, solid, mouth upon her throat and fingers twining in her hair, hips and thighs growing heavy upon hers. She wrapped her legs around him, urging him on¡ªyes¡ªand he sank into her with a groan that rumbled from the ground beneath her back. The canes twisted.


    Cassie¡¯s urgency was matched and returned. Rubus didn¡¯t pant or cry out, but his breath hitched whenever she did, and his thrusts were not the slow, patient rooting from before. They had waited too long, through the turning of the seasons to the cusp of summer. He drove into her with all the force of his pent-up longing, his terror, his hope. Cassie moved to taste him again, his mouth, his face, whatever she could reach, but she could not; he had exchanged his gentle caress for a hold upon her body that would keep her inside the bramble bower even as he was inside her, thorns pinning her hair to the ground.


    The cane bowed lower, closer, leaves trailing against her skin as the air became thick. Cassie writhed, close to sobbing once more: half in ecstasy, half in relief, entirely in love. She locked her legs around him, felt the gathering tension deep within herself that the dryad found again, and again, and again, until she could contain it no more, and neither could he. His thorns and fingers gouged furroughs into the earth about her. Sap flowed.


    When at last all subsided, and they lay in each other¡¯s arms, foreheads touching, canes unbowing, Cassie said:


    ¡°I love you.¡±


    Rubus opened his eyes and kissed her forehead, mouth lingering as he breathed. ¡°And I love you.¡± He released her from his thorns and lifted her into his lap. The bramble thinned; through the swaying leaves, Cassie could see the horizon beginning to glow in the east. Somewhere in the meadow, a bird began to sing.


    Rubus trailed his fingers in her hair, curling strands behind her ears. ¡°I have always loved you,¡± he murmured, turning towards the light, ¡°and I will always love you.¡±


    Together, the botanist and the dryad watched the sun rise.


    ?


    ¡°Are you sure you don¡¯t need another muffin?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m fine, Mom.¡±


    ¡°I made plenty.¡±


    Cassie smiled and slammed the trunk of her car shut with a rusted squeal. ¡°I know. But I¡¯m stuffed, and so is the car.¡±


    Mom wrung her hands.


    ¡°She¡¯s hardly even going anywhere, Mom,¡± said Matt, slightly bemused. He draped his arm comfortingly around his mother. ¡°And she¡¯ll be back nearly every week.¡±


    ¡°But she¡¯s going to be camping every week for a year! No apartment to go back to even, just out in the wild!¡±


    ¡°Ah yes, the untamed wilds of the Eugene-Portland corridor.¡±


    Cassie laughed. ¡°This is hardly different than what I¡¯ve been doing for months now, Mom.¡±


    ¡°It just seems so much more permanent, with all your things in storage.¡±


    ¡°She prefers living in the bushes anyway,¡± said Matt. ¡°She¡¯s a wildwoman.¡±


    Mom stopped wringing her hands and put them on her hips. ¡°Well, please just be sure to stay warm.¡±


    ¡°I will.¡±


    Cassie kissed them both. They waved goodbye to her until she was out of sight.


    ?


    The hill was lush and darting with swallows. Everything was green and rich, dark brown, damp and loamy. Cassie squelched her way up the slope, rucksack creaking with weight, and kept her eyes on her footing.


    The wind caressed her face. ¡°Cassie.¡±


    She looked up.


    There, standing tall before his bramble, the dryad waited for her. A swallow perched on his outstretched hand.


    Cassie broke into a run.

 Afterword & Acknowledgements

    The Boy in the Bramble was the very first novel I ever completed, out of the multitude I began and abandoned over the two decades I have been writing. Frankly, I have no idea why: despite my enjoyment of classics like Jane Austen¡¯s Pride and Prejudice and Emily Bront?¡¯s Wuthering Heights (yes, toxic, I know), as well as my unabashedly prurient delight in the romantic content present in fantasy novels such as Lois McMaster Bujold¡¯s Paladin of Souls, I have never been a particularly avid reader of romance. I had certainly never written it before. Why this was the first book to make it across the finish line, I can¡¯t say. But here we are.


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    The story took three years of intermittent poking and prodding, some pandemic-lockdown beta reading, and a detailed study of James Joyce¡¯s love letters to his wife to get to its current state. I hope you have enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.


    Many thanks to Clementine le Bas for nurturing this story when it was but a sprout. Several of the early chapters were co-written with her before she had to bow out. All content has been published with her knowledge and express written permission.


    And thank you to my husband, who assisted the writing process by gleefully interjecting with every botanical euphemism for sex he could think of.